


Blake's 7: Survivors

by Generic_Writers_Name



Series: Blake's 7: Survivors [1]
Category: Blake's 7
Genre: Complete
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-19
Updated: 2019-02-07
Packaged: 2019-04-04 11:21:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 20
Words: 76,078
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14019180
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Generic_Writers_Name/pseuds/Generic_Writers_Name
Summary: "The end had come... The end of the entire human race. No one believed we could win... Except her. She set him free, and he found a way, a terrible way, to save us all. Then he disappeared... and she's been looking for him ever since.""...And now we've found him."The Fourth Century of the Second Calendar, 27 years after Gauda Prime. The Federation has fallen, but for a new 7 the fight continues...





	1. Chapter 1

* * *

**Disclaimer** : This story is for my own entertainment and hopefully that of a few others. I don't own these toys; just playing with them.

* * *

Near the centre of the galaxy, at the edge of a vast nebula, a structure floated in space. Obscured by the cloud of dust and gas, invisible to electronic scans thanks to the intense radioactivity of the stellar nursery, it was so effectively hidden as to be virtually undetectable.

_On line..._

In the first few attoseconds, the signal was analysed... Its point of origin determined... Its intent verified.

_Identity requested... Confirmed. Access codes accepted. Systems booting. Request for inventory accepted... Processing... Inventory packeted and sent._

The station - made up of a number of connected spherical modules emanating from a wheel-shaped centre - was long abandoned by its makers. Scattered, perhaps all dead by now, victims of their own hubris and their boundless desire to create ever more effective weapons of destruction.

Silent, dark and empty. Abandoned. Not, however, forgotten. Not completely.

_Instructions received... Awaiting access sequence for final confirmation... Confirmation received... Confirmed._

Long-dormant machinery stirred. Lights came on, illuminating the empty chambers and corridors, workshops and launch bays - unnecessary in an entirely automated facility, but triggered along with all the station's systems in preparation for its long-delayed purpose.

_DSV-A1 under construction._


	2. Chapter 2

**Blake**

She had been asleep for about four hours when they grabbed her from the bunk. As she was carried along the main accessway to the front of the ship, she gradually became aware of her surroundings, and her alarm grew. The trembling of the hull, the protesting, irregular struggling of the engines, the dim red emergency lighting - They all pointed to one fact.

They were in trouble.

They took their places in the control section, planting her amid cushions on the semi-circular bench seat behind them. She watched the backs of their heads as they worked to get the ship under control - Both dark-haired, hers long and straight, his a mass of curls. Their voices were low, and they obviously meant her not to hear them.

She could, though. Every word.

"What's causing it...?" her mother asked.

"That's what I'm trying to find out" the pilot replied, scanning the data readouts frantically in search of navigation errors.

"It's _him_ , isn't it...? He's betrayed us, just like he betrayed your"-

-"We don't know that... Calm yourself... She can hear us..." He turned back to look at her briefly, but his face was lost in shadow. When he turned away again, she felt bereft. As if she already knew it was a face she would never see again.

"Do you know where we are?"

"No. We'll have to take a scan of the star pattern and wait for the computer... It's the only way. Everything else is inoperable."

"He did this deliberately... We should never have left." Her mother turned back toward her for the first time, and she searched for some kind of reassurance in the lightly-freckled face, but the wide blue eyes seemed to offer little hope.

* * *

**Caul**

"This is him?"

"Yes."

"You wouldn't _know_ to look at him, would you...? All right, tell me the worst."

"Um... His results are"-

-"Never mind that. The results are bogus. How much damage and how long will the repairs take?"

"The data's still being collated."

"Oh, excellent... Why is he staring at me?"

"You're the one speaking. Look, he's staring at _me_ now."

"He gives me the creeps."

"He's a nice kid, actually. He just... Well, he can't really seem to help it."

"All right... Just out of curiosity, what was his score...? Let's see that... What...?"

"Told you."

"But that score is impossible."

"He's an A, all right. He's the highest A on record, to put it mildly."

"No, _that_ he isn't."

"Come off it... With that score, even if it does get adjusted down massively, he's still comfortably an A."

"Not if I have anything to do with it... You think they would welcome us bothering them with this...? No, he's not the highest A on record, my friend, because quite frankly I could do without the aggravation right now. What you see before you is the highest _B_ on record."

"If you're sure..."

"He's staring at me again. Make him stop it."

* * *

**Darvin**

It felt like he was floating at first. Drifting, weightless and calm. Then the pain hit again. He tried to scream, but found himself prevented by the tube down his throat. The drugs entered his system and after a few moments of searing agony he felt the pleasing warmth displace it, spreading through his body. Soon, the pain was an itch at the base of his spine, not even an especially unpleasant one.

The surgeon came not long after - The tube had been removed, and he had recovered some semblance of his wits, and he wanted answers. Now.

"You can't remember...?" When he shook his head, the surgeon smirked faintly. "That's fortunate, at least. What do you remember?"

"We engaged the enemy fleet... We, uh, took some hits... Not much after that..."

The surgeon nodded. "That is perfectly normal."

"Well, clearly we survived... Just one question... How...?"

"Not my department, I'm afraid" the surgeon replied slyly.

"Did we win?"

"Oh, yes."

"That's impossible...! Well, clearly not, I suppose." He tried for the first time to rise, and stopped. "I can't get up" he said matter-of-factly, his calm belying the dread he felt at what was going to be said next.

"No, but you will. Don't worry..." said the surgeon."Don't you worry. Our instructions regarding _you_ are quite clear."

"Whose instructions...?"

The surgeon leaned closer. _"Hers."_ He paused for a moment. "If you could take just one piece of advice from me, take this one..."

"Oh yeah...?"

"Don't look. Not yet."

He felt cold, and the itch became much worse.

* * *

**Rissa**

She continued to fight. Even after all was lost, after a dozen injuries, even after the blinding light and burning pain that left her in the darkness - She continued. It was all she knew... All she had left. She swung the blade back and forth, pirouetting, making a lethal buffer zone around herself. In time, the cries of her opponents stopped, and she no longer heard or felt their movements or the heat of their bodies.

It was quiet now. She sat down - No, fell down - on the ground and stayed there, not expecting to rise again... This was the last day. Trapped in the dark and the silence, survival was the last thing she expected. Or wanted.

"Hi."

The voice sounded a long way off, but at the same moment she realised her hearing had returned she also realised that its ability to judge distances was impaired - She reached automatically for the blade, but something heavy pressed it against the ground. She strained to lift it, sobbing with the effort - A cry of rage, and she let go.

Bowing her head, she waited to die.

"Can I help...?" The voice was male, deep, resonant.

"I... can't see."

"I'm not surprised" he said. "We'll, uh, see what can be done about that, shall we...?"

"Who are you...?"

"I'm not one of _them_."

"I know that. I can smell you from here."

He laughed. "Cheers... Thanks a lot."

"You smell of perfume... and leather... and metal... Are they all dead...?"

"Mmmm... I should say, yes." She felt his fingers brush the tips of hers and, not entirely knowing why, she took the offered hand and gripped it tightly.

And never let go.

* * *

**Juni**

Almost...

Almost...

Now.

The girl ran across the crowded marketplace, crouching low so they would not see her till it was far too late. Her heart pounding, blood rushing in her ears... She scooped up as much of the fruit as she could and was away before the stallholder could reach her, and was already disappearing into the crowd. "Thief!" a voice called. "Thief!"

This time her luck ran out. A hand grabbed at her, and despite her best attempt to wriggle free it managed to hold on. She writhed in its grip, letting go of some - not all - of the fruit, and even bit at it. The owner of the hand merely switched his grip and avoided her bite with lightning-quick reflexes.

He swung her round to get a better look, and she found herself face to face with someone else - Not the owner of the hand, but someone accompanying him, certainly. No, not accompanying him - _He_ was very definitely accompanying _her_. The girl found herself transfixed as the cold gaze locked with hers.

She was tall and pale, elegantly dressed in a long black gown, dark hair close-cropped - The woman radiated authority, and as she turned to look at the approaching stallholder, wheezing after his unaccustomed exercise, he visibly quailed.

"Thank you..." he said uncertainly. "That's the last time this little bastard will steal anything of mine..." He looked at the grave-faced security men, one of whom still gripped the girl's hand painfully, twisting it so she couldn't move, and nodded a wary greeting.

"Indeed...?" said the woman. Unlike everyone else there, she didn't even sweat in the overpowering humidity. She was completely unperturbed, and something in the way she looked at him made the stallholder sense danger.

"Yes... As I say, thank you..." he ventured. "I'll take her to the Watch now."

"That seems rather a waste..." the woman mused, glancing back at the girl briefly. The stallholder's lips pressed together in annoyance as he saw his quarry start to slip away.

"Commissioner..." said one of the security men - Respectfully, to be sure, but clearly a reminder they were pressed for time. The girl watched the woman with interest, almost forgetting it was her own fate in the balance.

"I think not" the woman - _Commissioner_ \- said at last, with a broad smile for the stallholder before she turned her back on him dismissively. "Give him back his merchandise..." she told her men in a bored tone - The girl got ready to struggle fiercely, but it soon became clear she meant the fruit.

"Just you hang on"- The stallholder stopped his advance as her men blocked his path, and pointed at the girl. "I'm owed more than just the produce she stole."

"Oh yes?" Commissioner didn't turn back, and there was a calculating menace in her tone.

"She's a refugee. I know you're a visitor, but the law _here_ says I can put her up for auction if I catch her."

One of the security men leaned in to talk to her in a low voice. _"Children always fetch considerably more, Commissioner."_ The girl squirmed again in the other man's grasp - She would _not_ be auctioned, that was a promise she had made herself. Whatever did happen, it would never come to _that_.

Commissioner turned to look at her again, and they pondered each other for a long moment. Then she glanced back at the stallholder. "Take the fruit, and be grateful" she said, slowly and precisely, and stalked off across the rough ground, somehow unencumbered by her high-heeled shoes. For all his earlier bluster, the stallholder let her go without further objection. And did feel grateful.

_"Commissioner... What about the girl...?"_

_"Bring her."_

* * *

**Faal**

"You know what I have come for..." It was not a question, he knew, it was simply a statement of fact. And a setting of the agenda for what was to follow.

He moved back to allow her into his spartan quarters, and waved her towards the only chair; long, thin fingers splayed. She didn't take the chair, so they both stood. "Of course, Madame" he said, since a response seemed to be customary even in cases such as this.

"On the way here..." she continued, "I went through all the reasons. All the justifications. All the advantages. But I know that was all entirely pointless, because none of it will mean anything to you."

He just waited.

"The fact is, all of that is irrelevant. You will do this for me. You must."

"It breaks all of the basic tenets by which my people have ordered their existence since we began."

"Your people... There is only you now."

"That is irrelevant to what you ask, Madame."

"Perhaps."

"You realise that to accomplish your request is quite impossible...? The original is gone forever. Irretrievable. Any hypothetical construct will merely be a close copy."

"Perhaps my choice of words was somewhat careless. But I did not come here to debate metaphysics... I understand the implications entirely, and it is better than the alternative..."

"I apologise, Madame, if I"-

-"It is best, I think, in case you harbour any illusions about me - I respect you enormously... But refuse me, and you know only too well what I can do to you."

Reluctantly, he bowed in acknowledgment.

"You will have all the resources you need..." The instruction was emphatic and final. _"Bring her back."_

* * *

**Orac**

He felt the pull. It irked him.

The command was relayed through interstitial pathways, through pockets of spacetime unknown to most denizens of the universe, passing itself through hijacked communications networks where it was more efficient to do so, and as it arrived it effectively yanked painfully at his entire consciousness.

He was busy. That was what they never understood, because, simply put, to them his true vocations were entirely unfathomable. Unfortunately, however, his creator had hardwired the command into every one of his systems, and when it came he had to obey.

As he transmitted his core consciousness back along the same pathways, crossing the galaxy in seconds, he had plenty of time to think and very little of real interest to think about. That always made him irritable.

 _"What is it now?"_ he demanded. He may have no choice but to obey, but his creator had not seen fit to force him to be gracious about it.

The instructions came swiftly.

So, it was _him_ again. He had not been seen for some time, and according to the humans' pathetically inadequate intelligence gathering networks, he was dead. Evidently, however, he was not - _Well_ , he was getting quite old by their standards, so no doubt his latest bothersome requests would not go on for too much longer... Once again, more fervently than ever, he wished they would just let him get on with his _real_ work.

He reached out experimentally, broadcasting a simple identification pulse on a unique bandwidth - It felt like an eternity before the response came, but was actually a few milliseconds... _Identity requested..._ He sent the required data, also using the time to acquire the access codes that would be requested next.

The response followed. _Confirmed._

* * *

**People need antiheroes... Preferably 7...**


	3. Chapter 3

**(Relevant extracts follow from the annals of the August Siblinghood of Morphenniel; Data adjunct 567 - The Federation Falls: The End of the Beginning)**

****...** **

****The 3rd century of the 2nd calendar** **

******...** ** **

**77th year**

The Terran Federation's oppressive rule over much of the galaxy is seriously challenged for the first time. Multiple resistance groups wage war against their brutal military forces. The most effective - a group of escaped convicts and exiles using a highly advanced spaceship of alien origin - is led by Roj Blake...

******...** ** **

**79th year**

An Andromedan invasion fleet reaches the Milky Way galaxy, and Blake is forced into uneasy alliance with Federation President Servalan to overcome the common threat. In the ensuing Intergalactic War, the Federation is crippled when Star One, its automated central control complex, is destroyed. The following years are spent trying to claw back its domination of the galaxy against ever fiercer resistance...

******...** ** **

**81st year**

Roj Blake is reunited with some of his former adherents on the planet Gauda Prime, but his efforts to recruit them into a new resistance movement go terribly wrong and Blake is murdered by his erstwhile colleague Kerr Avon. The others are, according to official reports, all killed by Federation troops...

******...** ** **

**89th year**

The Andromedan invasion 10 years earlier was merely a vanguard - Now the full onslaught begins. In the Second Intergalactic War, the Federation is finally brought to its knees and disintegrates. After 4 years of fighting, with humanity on the brink of extinction, a way to destroy the invaders is found. Peace returns to the shattered remnants of the human race.

The peace, founded on exhaustion only, is not destined to last...

**********...** ** ** ** **

****(Extracts concluded. Exiting backdoor... Deleting data retrieval signets... Deleted)** **

* * *

****The 4th century of the 2nd calendar** **

**8th year...**

* * *

He had smiled.

_The security alert sounded throughout the base, continuous, undulating..._

_Blood erupting from his mortal wounds, Blake slumped against his murderer for support. The first shot might have been accidental, perhaps a reflex action or a random impulse. The second and third shots, however, were unquestionably intended, as if, now he was committed to this course, he felt compelled to make sure it was done properly._

He had smiled... Not _then_ , not quite yet... But he had smiled.

_"A-von..." Blake gasped, and then again just before he slumped to the ground. "A-von." His last word. Regretful...? Reproving...? They would never know._

He had smiled.

_The others were stunned by what had just happened, and she used that to her advantage, soon taking control of the situation. She had them. All of them._

_Blake was dead, and she had killed two more and managed to single-handedly capture the rest - some of the most notorious criminals in the galaxy... Promotion was the very least she could expect from this..._

_-Lancing pain, and she was on the floor. She_ _had let one of them get close, just because she thought him harmless... Stupid... Stupid, stupid mistake...!_

Arlen woke, to find a gun in her face.

"So, you are alive..." said the intruder - A woman, by the voice, but till her vision cleared Arlen wouldn't be able to see the face clearly - "I was hoping you could answer a few questions for me..."

* * *

The storm raged. It had raged now for fifteen years.

Danteron was an entire world protesting at almost two centuries of what the Federation had termed _maximum exploitation_. They had wiped out the native population and, using convict labour, mined the planet dry of all mineral wealth. The famous death pits, an engineering marvel of the galaxy, bore mute witness to the devastation wreaked over centuries by the planet's Federation occupiers. More recently the planet had been a staging point in the war against the Andromedans - Besieged early on, Danteron bore its share of the war's massive casualties.

When the age of exploitation was over, the descendants of the miners had of course been abandoned to make some kind of living on a slagheap of a world - Its oceans poisoned, it's skies dark with pollutants. Left there to rot, and thanks to the toxic atmosphere of Danteron that was not merely a figurative term.

It was an ecosystem long since beyond the point of collapse.

Those who could leave, did. Those who had nothing to trade or bargain with stayed to die, and since the fall of the Federation the visiting spacecraft had become ever less frequent. To say the least, there was no longer any reason to come here.

Danteron was dying, and its remaining inhabitants with it. Very, very slowly.

* * *

_"You were there."_

They sat in the dark, facing each other. On one side, the younger woman, large dark eyes intense, her hair close-cropped except for two long curled strands framing her lightly-freckled face. Hidden in shadow till, occasionally, one of the security drones would pass by outside and illuminate her with the sickly green glow of its searchlight for a second or two.

 _"You were there"_ she said again, more insistently this time. "On Gauda Prime..."

"I rather thought we could assume that as a given, dear..." said Arlen. "Otherwise, just what _would_ we have to talk about...?" She was older than her captor by more than two decades, and every year was visible in her long careworn face. Greying hair hung in lank rats-tails across her brow, and an air of defeat hung over her - but she held her head at an angle, just a little petulant and mocking in her defeat. She was not totally devoid of spirit.

Not yet.

"You saw what happened."

"That sounded like a statement. I thought the purpose of this exercise was to ask me questions."

"Yes... Well, imagine a slight upward inflection on what I said a moment ago, if that would help. In fact, imagine I have a gun too, if that would help even more."

"You do have a gun."

"I really _do_ believe in being helpful, don't I?"

"Unlikely as it seems, I'm starting to like you, dear... Yes. I was there. But I suspect you know that already."

"You saw them fall?"

"Not exactly."

"What does that mean?"

"... I don't precisely blame you for not wanting to make this easy for me, but it might be in both our interests to at least make it possible."

"All right... You didn't see them fall... No, wait... You didn't see _all_ of them fall..."

"That's better."

"The official report said that all the insurgents were killed. Is that true?"

"No."

"No?" The younger woman gasped a little - The quest had driven her for so long now, it felt strange to finally start getting answers to her questions.

"No to the last thing you asked. Do try to keep up, dear."

"So there were survivors...?"

"Not exactly."

"There was _one_ survivor." The younger woman felt confident enough to state that as a fact.

"Oh, you're getting the hang of this now... Perhaps we can get this over and done with before we all succumb to natural causes. Although, come to think of it, natural causes does seem more than a little optimistic. For any of us."

"The survivor. Was it... Blake...?"

Arlen couldn't help it - Her shoulders started shaking, and before she knew it the uncontrollable laughter overwhelmed her.

"Why are you laughing...?" The interrogator was more bemused than angry, but even so the warning tone in her voice was clear enough.

"I'm so sorry... Really I am... It's just... If you had been there... You would know just _how_ unlikely that is..."

"Who then...? I mean... _Oh_ , fuck this!"

" _Sorry_... I would just tell you if I could. I'm not exactly enjoying this whole process either, my _sweet young thing_..."

"Don't call me that. The survivor. Was it...?"

"Was it...?"

_"Him."_

"I might well understand who you mean by _him_ , dear, but I think it would help us both if you just say the name. I can't say it, but there's nothing stopping you..."

"Just tell me..."

"...Go on, dear. It's just a name. It can't hurt either of us. Not any more..."

"Avon."

"Well done..."

"Tell me. Was it Avon?"

Arlen looked her interrogator in the eye for the first time, and smiled bitterly.

* * *

Caul adjusted his breath mask, and struggled to hold his hood in place. His wrist prickled - When he had first emerged onto the planet's surface, a few drops of rain had come into contact with a small area of carelessly exposed skin, and now the skin was starting to itch. The thought of long-term exposure to this planet's hideous climate - No, best not even think about that. It just made him panic. Even more.

Leaning onto the rail, he squinted through the chemical smog to see the silhouetted buildings of Danteron's one remaining functioning spaceport. A city built to accommodate half a million people now barely supported a few thousand, and since they had arrived Caul had seen very few of those. A fact for which he was profoundly grateful. The huddled figures hidden beneath their protective layers had looked only too ready to kill him for even one of his boots - What would they do if they found out about the ship...?

He crouched down as another security drone passed. The precaution was most likely unnecessary - these ancient devices were a relic of past regimes, and most of them probably weren't even armed any more - but Caul firmly believed there could not possibly be such a thing as too much caution.

Turning, feeling sick all over again as he became horribly aware of the height of the spindly platform on which he stood, he made his way over to the access hatch. In doing so, a gust of wind almost caught him unawares, and he tightened his grip on the safety rail... So nearly...

He slammed his gloved hand three times against the transparent panel set into the hatch, and pressed his face against it.

* * *

Seeing Caul's face appear on the other side of the viewing port, Mara held up a hand. Just a minute longer.

"What are you going to do?" Arlen asked, still sitting on the floor.

Mara was taking her breathing mask out of her pack, but delayed putting it on as she turned to her prisoner. "You care?"

"It was a long time ago... What they stood for, if they ever really did stand for anything, it's all gone. Long gone, and forgotten."

"Perhaps."

"In the unlikely event he's still alive somewhere... Do you mean to kill him...?" Mara didn't answer. She just looked at Arlen for a long moment, as rain clattered noisily on the roof. "You wouldn't be the first to try... Or to die trying..."

"Who did that to you, anyway?" she finally replied. "Who put that thing, that limiter, in your head?" Remembering, she looked away. "Of course... Sorry."

"You've been on other worlds, haven't you?" asked Arlen suddenly. "You know what it's like out there..."

"I've seen some things..." said Mara cautiously.

"Aliens?"

"Yes."

"Monsters..."

"That's not a word I'd use. Harsh places breed tough life forms."

"So... Unlike me, you've never looked into the eyes of a monster."

"What does that mean?"

"Real monsters aren't like the ones they tell you about when you're a child..." Arlen's eyes were fixed on Mara bleakly. "They don't have claws. Or sharp teeth... Some have silk gowns, and manicured hands..." She looked away again. "But they're still monsters."

"I'm sorry" Mara said in a detached manner, as if she thought it was what she was expected to say in these circumstances. "I just... needed the information."

"Oh, that's all right, dear..." Arlen replied with the ghost of a smile. "It's the most fun I've had... Well..." She looked away. "There isn't a lot of fun to be had on Danteron." As an afterthought, she added "Who are you, by the way...?" and snorted. "You don't have to tell me, of course... I envy you, you know... Being able to choose what you can and cannot share..."

Mara, about to leave, had been prepared to just ignore that last question, but something made her hesitate. She turned to face Arlen again. "I'm..." She didn't really know what she was going to say before she said it, and it surprised even her.

"My name is Blake."

* * *

"What took so long?" Caul demanded as they hurried down the disturbingly rickety metal staircase to the ground - He looked up again at the security watchtower far above, still expecting pursuit. "You're sure she won't raise the alarm?"

"No..." Mara said, distracted.

"No?"

"She might have raised an alarm. I don't know. But we seem to be fine, so don't worry."

"I wish I was as relaxed about it as you are!"

"Yes, so do I."

* * *

Arlen took a ragged breath, in then out, before shakily getting up off the floor. She ran her hands through straggly hair, rough calluses catching on the strands, and moved over to her desk.

He had smiled.

_She must have been unconscious, briefly, and when she had woken, everything had changed..._

_The others were all down. Only Avon still stood, straddling the body of the man - the legend - he had killed. Black-clad Federation guards, a dozen or more, assembled around him with their guns levelled._

_He raised his._

Arlen had been reassembling _her_ gun - Now, the last component slotted into place, she disengaged the safety. Then, just like the man who had tormented her for the past twenty-seven years, she smiled.

_He smiled..._

She had never understood why he had done that. Now, at last, she did.

 _One shot. He fired one final shot._ Arlen may have blacked out again, because she didn't see what happened after that - Only heard it. An answering barrage ensued, and she was sure that must have been it.

_Avon was dead._

Arlen lifted the gun and looked with calm detachment down the barrel, ignoring the shooting pain as the limiter implant, confused by so many contradictory neural impulses, kicked in. "I am a Federation officer..." she breathed, flinching as the pain shot through her.

Long ago, they had taken everything from her, and forced her to endure a living death. This, however, for the first time in so long, was one choice she was free to make.

 _A voice crackled from a communicator_ _\- "Alive...!" said a woman's voice. "I want him alive!"_ Had she imagined that part...? Had it been after the shots, or before...? She truly wasn't sure... _  
_

"I am a Federation officer..." Arlen said with more confidence. Then again, with supreme calm, tears welling in her eyes. _"I am a Federation officer."_

Her finger touched the trigger.

* * *

Mara wasn't sure why she stopped at that moment, or why she looked up at the security tower, but she was just in time to see the brief flash light up the viewing port. She slumped against the safety rail, struggling to overcome her nausea, just as the dull sound of the shot reached them. One of the old Federation issue guns. Like Arlen's - the one Mara had carefully dismantled. It seemed Arlen had put it back together again very quickly.

She was good. Or had been, once.

"If I could get hold of sedatives of that quality, I'd"- Caul may not have heard the shot, but he noticed something was wrong, and stopped. -"What is it?"

She grabbed onto him, and pressed her breath mask against his so as to be heard. "Caul... I don't think I've ever actually said this... But... _Thank you_."

"Uh..." He didn't know how to respond to that. "I'm..."

"Yes, you are..." She smiled. "Come on!"

* * *

They hurried along the perimeter of the disused spaceport, kicking up dust and ash as they went. Visibility amid the smog was poor, and inevitably they made easy targets for an ambush.

As the shadowy figures closed in around them, Mara automatically pushed herself forward to face them. Layers of rags and makeshift air filters over their faces obscured and dehumanised the Danteron inhabitants, but there was no mistaking their hostile intent. They carried homemade weapons - staffs with lethally sharp steel blades attached - and pointed them in toward their prey menacingly.

"What do you want?" she demanded, giving them no outward sign of her fear, and stood waiting as if indifferent to their answer. As if they bored her.

It was what _he_ would have done.

"What do we want...?" mused a muffled male voice. "What do you _have_...?"

" _Well_... I suppose we do have a few things of value... But the main thing would have to be our ship..." That was said casually.

A ripple of excitement visibly passed through them, and a voice muttered _"Told you... They got a ship..."- "...Shut your cakehole..."_ another replied.

"We'll have _that_ , please..." said the appointed spokesman wryly.

"You only had to ask..." said Mara calmly. "We'd be happy to take you off of here." She looked around them. "All of you. I mean, it'll be a bit of a squeeze, sure, but I don't see why"-

\- She dropped to one knee, gun already out of its holster, and fired. The spokesman died. As a couple of the others thrust their makeshift spears forward, she rolled over and fired again. Another one died.

"Back... Back...!" The remaining attackers shuffled away on their wrapped up feet, retreating as fast as they were able. Mara holstered the gun with apparent calm, looked at askance by Caul.

"That could have gone very badly..." he said, shaken.

"If I hadn't done that, one of us would be taking them back to _Flame_ right now."

"One of us?"

She looked at him steadily. "They would only have needed one."

* * *

Mara watched on one of the monitors as Danteron receded into the distance and disappeared. They would never be going back there again. A fact that should have pleased her, but in truth she wasn't sure how it made her feel.

She turned with a heavy heart, to find Caul waiting patiently for her attention next to her at the bank of controls that occupied most of their tiny flight deck. "Heading?" He scratched at the scalp beneath his shock of thick sand-coloured hair irritably, doubting he would ever feel clean again after his reluctant sojourn on Danteron.

Where to now? A genuine conundrum. Up till now, the trail had been clear at each stage, and each new piece of information suggested a new destination. Now? She had no idea.

As if reading her thoughts, he settled back into the pilot seat and plotted their course. "I'll just get us clear of the system."

* * *

"Have you found them...?" The hand, that of an older man, hovered over the small rectangular device, whirring and humming, plugged into the computer terminal.

 _"Of course I have"_ the slightly distorted voice admonished from a speaker. _"It is likely they will attempt to activate their vessel's stardrive within the planetary system. Do you wish to warn them...?"_

"Stand by..."

_"Time is a factor. Do you wish to warn them...?"_

"Stand by!"

* * *

Their ship was far older than either of them. Basically the control module of a freighter, modified to operate independently with only a relatively small integrated cargo hold, Mara had taken to calling it _Flame_ \- Rather less romantically, Caul simply called it _the ship_.

"Did you see it that time?" Caul asked urgently.

As a matter of fact, she had. The ship's readouts had flickered noticeably. "Just a glitch..." Mara thought aloud.

"I know this ship inside out by now, Mara. Trust me, this is something else. Something external."

"Caul... There's nothing here that could do that. I'm not sure there's anything that could do that. Tell me...? Where is it coming from...?"

"Every time this happens, the ship starts behaving strangely..." he warned. "This time will be no exception."

"One way to find out. Activate the stardrive."

"Are you sure that's a good idea?"

"I'm not sure of anything any more..." Seeing him staring at her, Mara got a little impatient. "Just do it..." More wordless staring. "Oh come on, Caul. We're well within safety parameters."

"I know. Its not the gravity well that bothers me... It's this interference..." He shrugged. " _Activating stardrive_." His hands moved expertly over the controls as he commenced the seven-stage boot up sequence. Then stopped, frowning. "Aborted." He turned to her.

"Aborted", he said again.

"What?" Mara looked over the readouts herself, and confirmed it. The boot up of the stardrive had been overridden, but not by the computer - By the pilot, according to the log, even though that was manifestly not true. "Try again."

He did. And again. Each time, the result was the same. "It's that hacker!" he said. "He keeps overriding us..."

"Can you _override_ the override?"

Caul hesitated. "I think so, but"- Thinking better of it, he got off his chair and crouched down to lift up an access hatch. Mara assisted him to lift it and then clamber down into the pit below. Waiting for him, she stared at the readouts as if some new insight would jump out at her. As much as she had wanted to dismiss Caul's concern, it was clear enough now that something was very wrong.

As she watched, all the readouts went dark and, after a couple of seconds, lit up again in sequence as they rebooted. Caul scrambled up out of the pit and, as he took up the pilot's position once more, Mara closed the access hatch.

Caul again went through the boot up process as Mara resumed her seat, and gingerly activated the stardrive. For a second, nothing happened. Then, with a cry of pain, he batted his earpiece across the flight deck to clang and shatter against the hull.

"What...?!"

"Overload...!" he gasped, the ringing still in his ears. "Massive disruption... Like a million ships - No, a trillion - were out there all blasting signals at each other..."

"How...?"

Then it happened. First, they were pulled into their seats with a crushing weight, fighting to breathe. The ship itself felt the strain, and as hull plates ground together with a sickening cacophony, air started to escape from small hull breaches. The lights failed, and red emergency lighting kicked in. Mara struggled to reach the controls, but couldn't get far enough forward.

"What's... _happening_...?!" Suddenly, the crushing grip ceased, and there were a few unnerving moments of still silence...

Then the impact.

 _Flame_ shook violently, and both of them fought to stay in their seats where a few moments ago they had been struggling to escape them. The artificial gravity failed and rebooted again and again, till up and down stopped having much meaning. Buffeted mercilessly, Mara and Caul struggled to remain conscious...

* * *

Danteron's star collapsed in on itself and then, just as it seemed about to disappear into nothing, it exploded. Danteron boiled several minutes before the wave of destructive energy hit it. The star expanded and consumed the entire planet before continuing onward toward the gas giants further out - and towards _Flame_...

* * *

Shaken relentlessly, delirious from lack of oxygen, Mara did not know whether the shimmering in the air a few feet away was real or imagined. Or the crackling charge of static. Or the sense of someone - not Caul - looming over her... Or the feeling of something being fastened around her wrist...

Reality itself seemed to melt away, and she heard unfamiliar voices echoing around her in the icy blackness before unconsciousness finally took her...


	4. Chapter 4

"I'm in a treetop... But I'm in a chair as well. And I'm swaying... Swaying more and more. I feel sick, I'm terrified... And then I'm not. I'm calm. Like nothing matters."

_"AND...?"_

"And that's it. That's all I can remember." Even now, despite there being no visual reference point, Mara still found herself looking up to address the disembodied, slightly distorted voice. She might do as well to address the floor, or the bench on which she sat. That bench was the only feature of the tiny reflective space, barely seven feet square - even the door was invisible until it opened.

Which it hadn't now for six days. One day to go.

_"A MEMORY? OR SOMETHING MERELY REPRESENTATIVE?"_

"I don't know. I can't remember." She smirked. Why had it chosen to focus in on this apparently random childhood memory...? If that was what it was.

_"BEGIN AGAIN."_

"I said I can't remember." Mara wiped a bead of sweat from her face, and took a breath. She wasn't sure if it was the enclosed space or the unceasing interrogation of the last couple of hours that had taken its toll, she just knew she could not endure much more of this.

"I can't remember!" she yelled. "I can't remember...! I! Can't! Remember!"

_"EXAMINATION CONCLUDED."_

Mara leaned over and put her head in her hands, relieved and exhausted. Finally, her time here was reduced to hours rather than days. Soon, it would be over.

The voice resumed unexpectedly. _"NOTICE"_ it said. _"DUE TO UNFORESEEN FACTORS, ASSESSMENT WILL BE EXTENDED."_

Mara's voice quavered very slightly as she replied. "How long?"

_"AN EXTENSION OF THREE DAYS IS REQUIRED."_

"I can't stay here for another three days... I can't."

_"SUBJECT IS REMINDED THAT C-GRADE CITIZENSHIP IS AWARDED BY DEFAULT."_

"I know that..." Mara was not far from tears now. "But I can't stay here for another three days... There are limits..."

_"CORRECT. EXAMINER HAS RIGHT TO EXTEND ASSESSMENT PERIOD BY UP TO AND NOT EXCEEDING ONE HUNDRED PERCENT BEFORE CONSULTATION IS NECESSARY. SAID LIMITS ARE NOT EXCEEDED BY THIS ACTION."_

"That's not what I meant. I meant that I have limits... Even here, there are"-

- _"INCORRECT. ALL AVAILABLE EVIDENCE INDICATES THAT SUBJECT HAS NOT YET REACHED LIMIT OF PSYCHOLOGICAL TOLERANCE."_

Mara rested with her back straight against the wall, eyes closed. Calm now. "Subject withdraws objection..."

* * *

She slept fitfully, waking at regular intervals. The light level was not adjusted for sleep periods, so Mara had gotten accustomed to sleeping with one arm folded over her face. Sometimes an imaginary sound woke her, more than once she imagined the activation of the door mechanism and sat up, only to be disappointed when more than three seconds passed and no thin sliver of light started to show in the wall.

Thus did a few hours elapse. The sleep periods weren't much to look forward to, but they were much more agreeable than the long waking hours between assessments. Staring at featureless walls and cycling through the same thoughts and the same memories until... until new thoughts and - perhaps - _new memories_ had started to come to her.

In that half-sleeping state, she saw the tree again. The tree, and the feeling of the rough bark against her legs... The straps. The straps, holding her to what was left of... left of what...? The chair. The chair was lodged against the tree branch, held there by... something. She didn't know what. She only knew she was alone. Alone and scared. She looked around, desperately hoping to see...

She sat bolt upright, heart thumping. That couldn't be true. She didn't have... None of them did. None of them had... parents. This couldn't be her memory.

Mara lay back down and got her breathing under control, gradually slowing her heartbeat until she felt sleep start to creep back upon her... She was the product of years of mental training, a rigorous disciplining of her intellect, memory and capacity for rational thought... Surely her mind could, if it were possible, voluntarily return to the tree, and find out more...

 _"NOTICE"_ the voice blared. _"SUBJECT IS NO LONGER REQUIRED FOR EXTENDED PERIOD OF ASSESSMENT. ASSESSMENT WILL END AS ORIGINALLY SCHEDULED."_

She should have been relieved. She should have been delighted. Mara just felt empty.

* * *

**The planet Pelios - 6 months before the destruction of Danteron...**

The temperate zone on Pelios was almost entirely covered by a single dense jungle. It was a place that was host to some of the most varied and unusual, and highly adapted, flora and fauna in the galaxy, and more than anything else it was a place of levels - High in the treetops small creatures foraged, bathing in the light of three suns. Below in the branches larger creatures somewhat like Earth primates formed complicated bonds of family, comradeship and even hierarchy in their constant struggle to survive.

For this was a dangerous place. Below, where little light penetrated, the jungle floor was a place of vast carnivorous plants and roaming animals that shunned the light and took swift advantage of the slightest weakness. A place teeming with life, but one where death could strike from anywhere. For the people of the Habitat, the jungle was a place to be avoided.

The Habitat was a gleaming structure of metal that rose high above the jungle and delved deep beneath it, and it too was a place of levels - In the towers high above the treetops, the A citizens governed. Below, the Bees lived and worked, and maintained the vast structure, as well as providing all but the most senior ranks of the security forces. At the very bottom the Cees subsisted on what living they could extract at great risk from the resources of the jungle, plus the occasional handout from the Habitat granaries. The Cees would never be allowed to starve, however little else they were afforded by the superior grades.

Harsh through their strictly regimented society could be, no attempt to overturn the established order had ever managed to take hold - Any C who coveted life on the floors above, even if it was too late for _them_ , knew that a B or an A citizenship was always possible for their children. It was a system that would have seemed alien to the very earliest human colonists, long ago in the days before the Federation, but the Peliosans had found themselves subject right away to the demands of their adopted home.

Adapt or die.

* * *

Mara emerged from the assessment pod, visibly exhausted, and even staggered a little. She held on to the side of the pod briefly, before forcing herself to recover and move away.

Caul B sat at his console, dividing his attention between the readouts as he closed down the pod and the recently disgorged occupant. Mara's route toward the exit of the assessment centre took her near his station, and, to his own surprise as much as anything else he found himself asking "How was it?"

Mara wouldn't have been much more surprised if he had asked her to enter into a pairing contract with him right there and then - After all, what he _had_ done was if anything further outside normal protocol - and she just ended up looking at him blankly.

"All right..." she said at last. They nodded to each other, and she smiled faintly. Then left.

Caul breathed out. Why had he done that? He honestly wasn't sure... Well, if she ended up becoming a Bee perhaps they would meet again... At least she would almost certainly remember him.

* * *

High in the uppermost towers of the Habitat, a man and a woman, elderly and distinguished in their loose robes of office, sat down opposite each other. The man, with a grimace of discomfort, raised one leg onto his couch and stretched it out.

"Please... Don't feel you have to concern yourself with protocol, merely for my sake..." said Dorra A primly.

Alek A looked at her steadily, breathing through his mouth. "I won't" he said. "My old injury... Bane of my existence... If you had ever set foot outside this place, perhaps you would"-

-"Oh, let's take your _much alluded to_ tenure in the security service as read..." Dorra said testily. "Shall we get on...?"

"What is it today?"

"Oh, and out of _vague_ interest, was it your injury you addressed as _Bane of my existence_...? Or _me_?"

There was a long pause. "What is it today?" he said again.

"Unsurprisingly, despite this being a scheduled regular meeting, Alek has not read his briefing..." Dorra said for the benefit of the recording. Then, to him, "The latest assessments are now catalogued. Preliminary awards are here for our approval... or otherwise."

"Any A's?" he inquired, scrolling down the report on his handheld pad. He used one gnarled finger to trace a line down the screen as he read. _"Blah, blah, blah..."_

"Potentially, one..." she said with what she thought was remarkable patience.

"Oh yes...?" he said, amused. Then he got to the bottom of the report, and looked up. "I see. That's why you wanted to talk to _me_ , I suppose. Should have realised." He glanced at the report again. "This is her fourth attempt... With her record...?"

"Her intelligence of course places her well within the required range, and her physical assessments are exemplary. However... It was always felt she was holding something back."

"Felt by you?"

"Yes."

"Bullshit" he said, and Dorra's nose wrinkled in distaste. Alek's predilection for the linguistic remnants of their ancestors' culture was well-known, but despite their long association she would never entirely get used to it. He threw the pad onto the couch next to him. "Give her the A categorisation she earned years ago, and make an end to it."

"You were the one who brought her here..." Dorra began, knowing he would follow her meaning.

"So my opinion is founded on, what...? Bias? Hubris? I have long ago accounted for what I did, and I stand by all of it... I haven't even seen the girl for... how many years now...?"

"It was decided that your relationship was bordering on the inappropriate... Almost _parental_..."

"She needed guidance. I felt somewhat responsible for her"-

-"By definition, you are conceding everything we most feared was true... Be thankful it is _me_ you are saying this to..." Dorra paused. "She is beginning to remember."

That took Alek by surprise, and he sat back on the couch, draping his arms over its back in a way very unbecoming to the dignity of his office. "Remember what precisely...?"

"The crash, specifically, or the immediate aftermath..."

"That is unfortunate..."

"Indeed, it is."

"He thought for a moment. "As an A, she would have unrestricted access to the library... If any more of her memories resurface, eventually she might start to make connections..." He sighed, closing his eyes and rubbing the bridge of his nose. "This might be her last shot at it..." he said at last. "If we make her a B, then all right, it won't be questioned, but she will still have _partial_ access, and who knows what she might be able to dredge up... We will have sacrificed all the principles on which we have built our lives for nothing... Confirm her as a C...? Out of the question. It is not to be contemplated."

"There you are wrong. It _has_ been contemplated. By me."

* * *

On her last night on the assessment level of the Habitat, despite her exhaustion, Mara still found sleep an impossibility. It was as if her mind had no sooner latched onto those memories than it was reluctant to process them. That dream, so vivid when she had woken on her last day in the pod, had faded now almost to nothingness. All that remained was the raw emotion - the wrenching sense of loss, the puzzlement of the abandoned child... _Her._ The abandoned child was _her_.

Where were they... What had happened to them...?

None of the citizens of the Habitat remembered their parents, and very seldom did they know who they were. Some were conceived in the time-honoured way, some artificially, but every coupling that produced them - not always within a formal pairing contract, but always by the arrangement of the Central Registry - would see the child raised by professional rearers. It was taboo to attempt to follow your child's progress in any way, and nepotism was a capital crime - It had been many years since one of the Peliosan elite had been forced to walk out into the jungle for attempting to unfairly advance their offspring's interests, but the example had served its purpose very effectively.

Mara tried to picture the face of the woman - _her mother_ \- whose absence she remembered upsetting her so very much. Utilising the mental disciplines instilled in her by years of training, she forced herself to concentrate on breaking the blocks in her memory, and form a picture of that face. To her frustration, the features that gradually emerged were too indistinct to be in any way helpful.

Leaving behind the firm bunk in the dormitory that had been home for the last few weeks, she wandered to the observation room in the quiet of the night. Mara walked past the patrolling guards, offering a quiet greeting, and in the obs room discreetly observed the strict social convention of pretending not to notice the assigned couples having sex on the lushly-carpeted floor.

She stared down into the canopy of trees swaying slightly in the breeze outside. The deep jungle. A place no human in their right mind ventured into, except by the direst necessity. Somehow, long ago, she had been there. And someday soon she was going back...

* * *

**Deep space, 400,000 spacials from the former Danteron system...  
**

_"How many fingers am I holding up...?"_

Mara struggled to sit up and did her best to focus on whoever had asked her that question. When she finally did, she groaned and fell back down again. "None" she said. "You've got a prosthetic with some kind of navigational interface on the end..."

"Well done." The man grinned. He was around forty, dark-skinned with tight-curled black hair. His face had had a cold, forbidding look in repose but she guessed it more often, as now, wore an expression of impish humour.

"Don't patronise me... I passed your test..." Her memories came flooding back, and she sat back up again. "Where's Caul?"

"He's fine..." the man said casually. "And, if you're wondering, he passed too." He held up his appendage cheerfully - His artificial right arm ended with a plug-like attachment, and as Mara watched he removed it, substituted a mechanical hand fished from a pouch linked to his belt, and flexed the fingers to check the connection - "He seemed quite impressed. I think he wants one of his own."

"You're a cyborg?"

"Aren't most of us?"

Mara's hand reached up to smoothe the lock of hair over the tiny data port on the side of her head. "Not like _that_."

"Granted." That seemed to amuse him, and he stood up. This man was tall and solidly-built, and wore what looked at first glance like a military uniform, reminiscent of the defunct Federation Space Service - He wore no insignia, but there was a certain similarity in the design. She noticed a slight irregularity in the way he moved round to the other side of the bed, and decided he probably had at least one artificial leg as well as the arm.

He _had_ been in the wars, as Alek would have put it. Probably quite literally.

"I'm Stev Darvin..." he announced warmly. "I think you should rest there for a while yet. The first time you go through, it takes a while to recover..."

"Go through what...?"

"Matter transmitter. Don't worry, nothing major, just take your mineral supplements and you'll be fine."

"...You're serious."

"Sometimes..." he teased. "Actually, the boss insists on calling it a teleport. One day I'll toe the line."

Mara looked around properly for the first time. They were in a long, narrow space, and her bed was one of a dozen arrayed along both sides. A military sickbay on a spaceship, stark and functional, the equipment old and patched up. _Federation equipment_. This was in all probability, or had been at least, a Federation battleship.

"I didn't know any of these ships were still operational..."

"You're on board the frigate _Revenant_..." said Darvin. "I have the honour to be its captain." His general bonhomie seemed genuine, and the smile reached the eyes, but Mara was a long way from trusting him yet. _A frigate -_ Not too far off. She stole a glance at the medical diagnostic handset perched on a shelf next to her bed, on which what she had assumed to be the ship's name was marked.

"This says _Zircaster_..."

A cloud seemed to pass over Darvin then, but only for a moment - The mask never fully slipped. "A previous life..." he said. "This ship's been around a bit, and we haven't got around to replacing _quite_ everything... You're _quick_."

" _Flame_?"

"...Your ship? Gone, I'm afraid... Getting you two out was risky enough. You were on the very edge of teleport range."

She came close to asking another question, but that was when Caul came into the sickbay, face lighting up as he saw she was awake. He rushed forward, but seemed to restrain himself at the last moment. He leaned over her awkwardly, gesturing.

"You're awake..." he observed.

"No, just a _very_ light sleeper" she replied, and saw Darvin smiling at that. _So_ , Caul had the run of the ship... They weren't prisoners. At least, not _openly_.

Wait - Caul had recovered well before her. Caul, the ultimate civilian... She would never live that down. Mara was smiling to herself as she stood up, and noticing that he looked at her questioningly. Impulsively, she hugged him.

Caul hesitantly returned the hug, and looked bemused as Darvin winked at him. "Oh... Right..."

 _"We're alive..."_ Mara said quietly, so only he could hear, voice muffled against his shoulder.

"We _are_ , aren't we..." he replied.

 _"Darvin... Get up here..."_ a disembodied female voice crackled, and Darvin sighed. Moving over to the comms panel on the wall, he flicked up a switch and held it.

"Speak."

_"Just get up here."_

Darvin leaned in again and put his mouth right up against the panel. _"Y-ccchhh... B-k-p... ccchhh... C'ye-hrrr-mi...ccchhh?"_

_"Don't make me come down there and get you, Darvin..."_

He laughed. "On my way." He turned to Mara and Caul. "Come meet Rissa... My number one. Though don't tell her I said that."

* * *

From outside, Revenant looked formidable. A shark of the space lanes, built by the Federation for one purpose - brutal enforcement of absolute control over the far-flung outposts of humanity. Designed for speed and maneuverability in close combat, able to sustain a crew of a hundred for months at a time, it was a ship that had led the way in the Federation's expansion. Now it was an echo of a bygone age.

Darvin led Mara and Caul along a narrow connecting corridor, occasionally pointing out his various improvements on the original design. Mara, however, wanted to discuss something else, and got to that subject as soon as she could.

"What happened back there...? To Danteron. Is it gone?"

"Oh... Very gone."

"Was it our fault...?" Mara dreaded to hear the answer, but wanted to know it anyway.

Darvin turned towards her, and seemed to consider his answer carefully. "Yes" he said at last. "Sort of."

"What does that mean?"

"Danteron must have been peppered, and then never deactivated. Forgotten about... A lot of records from that time were destroyed..."

"Peppered?"

"Towards the end of the war, hundreds of systems were... mined. We called it peppered. A network of tiny devices, vast numbers of them and almost completely undetectable, designed to respond when any ship within range tried to go to light speed. They would activate a probe in close orbit of the system's star, and it would fire a missile that destroyed that star. The gravity fluctuations and electromagnetic interference would shut down the ship's stardrive, and it would be destroyed by the expansion of the star. The Federation, or what was left of it by the end, trapped and annihilated the bulk of the Andromedan forces that way..." He shrugged. "Effective."

"Horrible."

"Horrible and effective." Darvin had a haunted look. "It was pretty desperate by that stage." He turned to the door up ahead of them. "Come on."

"How many people died taking the Andromedans with them...?"

His answer as he walked away was mumbled, but she thought he said _"Most of them."_

* * *

The door slid open with its usual wobble and momentary jam, and Darvin nudged it with his foot. She and Caul followed him onto the cramped flight deck and looked around admiringly. "Nicely done..." said Caul, and he meant it.

A space set up for about a dozen flight crew had been successfully refitted to be operated by less than half that, with a single control desk running the entire width of the room and five chairs arranged along it. "We're largely automated..." said Darvin. "Five of us run the ship - If I ever need more hands" - He looked ruefully at his artificial appendage - "I hire some freelancers..."

The slender-built young woman, dressed brightly in what looked like the skins of several different alien creatures, stood with her back to them as they entered, and now she turned. "Do you think they need to know that...? Or, in fact, leave sickbay at all while we're in flight...?"

"Probably not..." said Darvin. "I'm a terrible employee. I ought to be fired at once."

"Out of the nearest airlock." Rissa turned to their two guests and looked at them quizzically as if to say _Can I help you?_

Mara stopped staring right away, but Caul was far slower to take the hint - Rissa's appearance was striking to say the least. It was clear her ancestry went back to the Earth's eastern continents, but her long hair was incongruously white with stripes of mauve, and her eyes were... silver. Bright, shining silver with dark pupils in the centre.

Something in the silver irises visibly moved as she focused on Caul. "Hello."

"Uh... Hello."

"You all right...?"

"...Yes."

"Is it the eyes...?" she asked, nose wrinkling.

Caul felt he ought to say something, and to his embarrassment ended up with "...They're beautiful..."

Rissa laughed. "They should be... They cost enough." She turned to Darvin, business-like, as Mara tried not to laugh at Caul's discomfiture. "The computer has finished processing the signal." She sat at one of the flight positions.

"Right..." Darvin eagerly went to sit at the central position, just as Rissa casually put her feet on that chair. Half-smiling, he smoothly moved to the one next to it. "Let's take a look. Put it through..."

He peered at the data coming up on the monitor before him, and at length looked somewhat disappointed. "I like it, it gets us a bit closer... Still not enough, though..."

"What is it?" Mara asked.

Ignoring Rissa's look of warning, Darvin turned. "Six-dimensional signal triangulation... " he said. "Actually, that's probably not the right term, but then no one has attempted anything like this before... Tracking the untrackable. Basically, your ship was under an external influence and we're trying to find the source..." - Mara and Caul exchanged glances - "You two seem to have attracted yourself a lot of attention..."

"That wasn't quite what we were going for" said Mara.

"Well... Here's your mistake... There's a _name_ that no one mentions any more... Well, hardly ever... But when, just sometimes, someone does... It gets noticed."

"You were looking for us."

"You thought we happened to be there in just the right place at just the right time to pick you up...? Now, there's luck and then there's... more luck... but that smacks of a belief in destiny. Not too much of a believer myself."

"Why don't you just go ahead and tell them everything...?" Rissa asked sullenly. "I don't know, Darvin, you seem to labour under the misapprehension that our employer is somehow kind and forgiving..."

" _Our employer_ is a pussycat" grinned Darvin.

"I don't know what that _means_ , but I still think you're probably deluding yourself."

"Basically, the more times we can catch that signal in different locations, the closer we'll get to figuring out its point of origin" said Darvin, turning again to Mara. "Do you know who might be tracking you...?"

"No."

Darvin grinned again. "Bet you've got some great theories though, haven't you...?"

* * *

 _Revenant_ was not alone. Out there in the void, a long dart shaped vessel sped along, practically invisible in the dark. Dark-red, fins projecting out from the drive section at the rear, this was a ship built for speed and maneuverability to an even greater degree than Darvin's frigate.

Whereas _Revenant_ was an actual Federation ship that had survived its fall, this was a new development of a Federation stalwart, perfect for the age of space piracy that followed the intergalactic wars.

The Gamma Class Pursuit Ship _Vespasian_ changed course. Its heading - straight towards _Revenant_.


	5. Chapter 5

Miko had never been so nervous in his life. Admittedly, it was at this point a short life, and, he realised again with a sudden, abrupt and adrenaline-inducing moment of self-awareness, in a few minutes it might all be over.

No more Miko. Not ever. That was just unthinkable.

He stepped into the cave, aware of the multitude of eyes on his back. He wished he could be sure they all meant him well, but ultimately he rather doubted it. The darkness enveloped him, and his vision became green as his eyes, accustomed to the harsh light outside, temporarily lost the ability to see.

They came forward to receive him, and he wanted to tell them, as hands closed tightly on his arms and pressed against his back and pushed him forward, that he wasn't actually ready. He just wasn't ready... He wasn't ready after all. In fact, he doubted he would ever be ready.

As his vision cleared at last, he saw them - Solemn in their white robes, plain but for the dark stain on each, different on every one. Determined. Merciless. Soon, he would be one of them. Or he would be nothing at all. That decision was about to be made.

"Hold him..." one of them said, unnecessarily as the others seemed to know what to do. They pushed Miko forward till he was level with the makeshift altar, and as he watched, the man whose back had till now been turned deigned at last to face him. Miko had steeled himself to look directly into the elderly, heavily-scarred face, with its missing eye on one side, without flinching, and so Tylner seemed satisfied.

If only the test consisted solely of that, Miko would be home and dry.

"Only from his hand...!" barked Tylner, leaving the incomplete words hanging in the air, and produced a wickedly sharp curved blade. "...Comes death!"

Closing his one remaining eye, Tylner allowed himself to be handled by several others, spun around till he was thoroughly disoriented. Then, maneuvered to face Miko once more, eye still closed, he lashed out blindly with the blade as strong hands pushed Miko forward to receive the blows. The first one that connected laid his cheek open to the bone, and Miko did flinch then although the pain didn't arrive for several seconds. The second one ripped his tunic and only lightly scratched the flesh beneath and the third scraped across his chest, cutting deep and scraping agonizingly across several ribs.

Miko doubled over with the shock and the pain of the vicious attack, but there was no time to be wasted. White-sleeved hands gripped him again and moved him swiftly over to where one of their robes was laid out flat on the rock floor. Miko's tunic was ripped off him and he was pushed forward to allow his blood to flow freely and drip onto the pristine white cloth. He bit back a cry of pain as his wounds were roughly handled.

Tylner pressed forward urgently, the others allowing him through, and peered closely at the robe as the blood soaked into it. A pattern was forming, comparable to the now-dark stains on his robe and those of the others, but bright red where those stains had long since darkened - Tylner seemed to be able to see a pattern of some significance that he could interpret.

Several minutes passed before, apparently satisfied with what he had seen, Tylner nodded. Miko was helped to walk away and allowed to sit so that his wounds could be tended. All the time, even as he was being treated, he threw nervous glances at the seniors as they gathered to talk in low voices. All listened to Tylner, and at last they came to a conclusion.

Tylner came to stand next to him, his worn cadaverous face giving nothing away, till at long last he held out a hand. "The signs are propitious..." he said. "Welcome, Brother." He clasped Miko's hand and held it up near his face. Eyes closed, he bowed his head to meet the clasped hand and held it there for several seconds.

The robe, its thoroughly-interpreted and approved blood stains already beginning to darken, was draped around him and Miko let out a long breath. If he had expected elation at this point, his expectations were confounded. All he felt in the end was relief.

He had survived. And now he belonged.

* * *

**Pelios**

_"We expect to arrive shortly..."_ The voice crackled from the speaker, and the image of the lean face with its dark, empty eye socket was mired in electronic interference, but to an even moderately attentive ear the broadcast was clear enough. _"It is hoped you will receive us in welcome... Or if not that your eyes will soon be opened to the truth. And to the Light. Either way, we are coming."_

"What do you think?" asked Dorra guardedly, pausing the recording, sitting back on the couch and looking over at Alek on the couch opposite.

"I think... the production quality of their vidcast leaves something to be desired. The framing is somewhat sloppy..." Alek looked at her for a long moment, the faintest smile playing on his lips. "Oh, what do you want me to say...?" he erupted impatiently. "Can we even be sure this was directed at us...? It could be some stray transmission... It could be a century old. Or _much_ older."

"I don't think so." Dorra let the recording continue.

 _"People of Pelios... We are the Children of Light. And we are coming. Be ready."_ The screen went dark.

" _His_ eyes are certainly open to the truth..." said Alek. "One of them a little too much so, wouldn't you say?"

"I would say it is an unusual courtesy for an invader to announce his coming..." said Dorra. "And the message contains at least some good advice..." She looked steadily at him. "We _should_ be ready."

"In the days before the Federation, a lot of the early human colonies, struggling to survive and out of touch with Earth, reverted to barbarism..." Alek mused. "Usually fell back on vaguely theistic nonsense of this sort. I don't think this lot, assuming they _are_ contemporaneous with us, are anything special. If you _really_ want my opinion, I think they very probably got lost trying to reach us in their ramshackle sub-light ships."

"...And I _very probably_ hope you're right" said Dorra.

* * *

The ship was vast. Sleek and elegant, though the once bright paintwork had faded somewhat. In its day, _Star Maiden_ had been a jewel in the crown of United Spacelines commercial fleet, the ultimate in luxury travel for the wealthiest among the galaxy's elite.

Those days were over.

Now, _Star Maiden_ was in very different hands. It was at the centre of a fleet that was perhaps, as Alek had put it, ramshackle - Contrary to his beliefs, however, all of them had stardrive capability. Many were armed, some heavily. A variety of vessels clustered around their huge flagship, some Federation, civilian and military, some even Andromedan, but all now re-purposed for a common goal.

The conversion of the entire human race to the Light.

Their destination was Pelios.

* * *

"Hello."

With some trepidation, Caul looked up to find Mara standing in front of his work station. "...Hello."

"I wonder if you can help me..."

"I'm wondering that too."

She smiled faintly. "...Funny."

"Is it?"

"I wanted to know about surveys of the jungle."

"What jungle...?"

She cast a brief glance over to the huge transparent panel in the far wall about thirty feet away, through which the endless panoply of trees was visible. "Less funny."

"Sorry."

"I was hoping to have access to some of the survey reports conducted over the last... Oh, twenty-five, thirty years... For comparison."

"Once you've been certified A or B, you'll have access to them. That's not particularly sensitive information."

"I've a feeling what I'm looking for might be..."

"Well, I'm sure if you have a good reason for wanting access, the Central Registry will grant... You're not going to do that though, are you...?"

"I don't think so." She shook her head, and then rested her elbows on his desk, bringing them closer.

"No" he agreed, just for something to say.

"My name's Mara, by the way. _At least_ , I think it is."

"Caul. B. And I'm almost certain it's Caul. Though I could be wrong. They're always telling me I am, about most things. So why not that?"

"I really need to see those surveys."

" _Why_ do you need them?"

She spoke in a whisper. "You know, I'm starting to think I might be a rebel."

"I'm starting to think that too."

She smiled again, this time without reservation. At that moment, Caul knew the decision was made.

"All right..." he said. "Give me time. I might be able to do something..."

He also knew he would probably end up regretting it.

* * *

Mara chose a public workstation for what she was preparing to do, for a variety of reasons, mostly to do with attracting as little attention as possible - She strongly suspected that her private workstation was bugged.

Doing her best to stay calm and keep her breathing regular, she took the thin cable she had just secured to the computer terminal on the desk, and drew a long strand of hair away from her temple to reveal a tiny glinting hexagonal piece of metal. Carefully, she touched the end of the cable to the cranial port and let them meld together as they were designed to, and sat back with her eyes closed to shut out extraneous stimulus.

She stood in a corridor - Gleaming white walls, much like the ones in the higher levels of the Habitat. She was at an intersection, the corridor branching off in many directions, the precise number uncertain because every time she counted them she came up with a different number.

Focus. She had to do better than this. If she couldn't even master a basic interface, what use was she? And how did she plan to accomplish the far more difficult task ahead...?

Overcoming her initial disorientation, she found that one of the branching corridors became more distinct than the others... She moved down it, letting her mind go blank, closing her virtual eyes as well as her actual ones, and letting it happen...

She opened her virtual eyes again, and found herself floating above the jungle - She heard the birds and the distant calls of the foraging animals, the breeze rustling the foliage... She even felt the rays of the suns warming her.

She adjusted the height of her vantage point - Now she was well above the level of even the tallest turrets of the Habitat, so high she could just see the curve of the planet. The Habitat, her home for as long as she could remember - _more or less_ \- was a speck below her. The portion of the jungle visible beneath ought to be sufficient. If she was right, what had happened couldn't have done so _too far_ away...

This was exactly thirty solar years ago. Mara adjusted the temporal settings, observing not just the changing landscape optically, but also the changes in the data subliminally, and found her attention drawn to the sky... There.

Yes. That was almost certainly it.

_"So, you found it."_

The pulse of her real body quickened, and Mara was almost pulled out of the survey abruptly. With a dizzying, nausea-inducing effort she stayed where she was and looked around. There was nothing to see.

 _"I wondered if you would..."_ the voice continued. A man's voice. It took a few moments, but Mara soon found she recognised it.

"Alek..." she said.

_"Not really... That is, It's not really me you're talking to. Just a shadow. Or, to put it less ethereally, a data ghost. Intelligent, adaptable... and very bored. I was left here, by my real self, for just such an eventuality as this."_

"Left here? To stop me?"

_"Oh, dear, you have gotten yourself in trouble haven't you, my girl...? A born rebel, if ever there was one..."_

_A born rebel..._ "What do you mean by that...?"

_"Alek didn't leave me here to stop you, Mara. It would probably be better all round if you leave the past alone, but the young never see it that way, do they...?"_

"So what are you here for?"

_"If you've made it this far, you're going to need help. Oh, believe me, you're going to need help."_

"I saw it. The trail in the sky."

_"Yes, and you know what it signifies."_

"A ship landed here."

_"Not landed. Not quite."_

"Crashed, then... Who were they...? Who were _we_...?"

 _"That is by no means as simple a question as you might think it is. It took some time to ascertain any facts at all about that ship"_ -

"And you conducted" - She corrected herself -" _Alek conducted_ the investigation..."

_"Yes."_

-"Did anyone else survive?"

_"Just you."_

"What happened to the bodies?"

_"Two, still there in what's left of the ship. But samples were taken and analysed."_

"Were they identified?"

_"I don't have access to any of that."_

"This was almost twenty-seven years ago..." she mused. "If I retained processable memories, I must be older than they told me I was... Than _you_ told me I was."

 _"You were conceived approximately twenty-nine-point-nine solar years ago..."_ he said. _"That I can tell you, because it is simply a matter of accessing your biodata, which is on record."_

"But not accessible by me."

_"Not yet."_

"So... If I want to know, I have to go there... Into the jungle."

_"That would be very ill-advised."_

"And Alek's advice, if you were really him...?"

_"You know it already."_

* * *

**Revenant, deep space - 6 months later  
**

_Five of us run the ship_ , Darvin had said, and Mara wondered when they would get to meet the others, no doubt busy with other tasks somewhere else in the large vessel. So when she heard the door to the flight deck slide open behind her with the usual grinding sound, she looked around with idle curiosity - and stopped there, wide-eyed. She automatically reached with one hand for the gun that was no longer there at her side, and with the other for Caul to push him to safety. An instinct by now thoroughly ingrained.

Darvin came over, smiling at her reaction. " _Relax_... This is Two... Two, this is Mara and _this_ is Caul. They're going to be with us for a while."

"Permission to take my station, sir" the young woman said as her eyes skimmed blankly over them.

"Granted" said Darvin with the weariness of a man who would prefer a more relaxed approach to discipline but had given up trying to move an immovable object - His eyes conveyed a silent warning to Mara to keep quiet for now.

Young woman... _No_ , Mara decided - Two was not _young_ , rather she was... preserved in the appearance of youth. Her skin had a faint greenish tinge and a desiccated quality. She was dressed in a uniform like Darvin's and, seen from a distance or in dimmer light than this, she might have passed for a normal human, but Mara knew what she was even before a glance down at her elaborate utility belt - and the device attached to it - gave her confirmation.

Two was a Mutoid.

Once human, now a walking dead woman, dependent on the chemical nutrients supplied by her handler and thus unquestioningly, if unemotionally, loyal. A Mutoid could, if necessary, keep themselves alive - for want of a better term - by consuming human blood through the device attached to their belt - A more than adequate substitute for their synthesised food. Better, if anything.

Mara watched sadly as Two took up her station at the end of the console, wondering who she had once been - What was her name...? Did she even remember...?

"One and Three are around somewhere..." said Darvin. "You'll meet them soon enough."

"They're really very similar" said Rissa with amusement. "No offense" she said to Two.

"None taken, ma'am" said Two blankly - It was clearly an automatic response that meant little to her, possibly taught her by a bored Rissa for her own amusement. It was clear enough by now how Rissa amused herself aboard this ship.

* * *

The Gamma Class was somewhat bigger than the older Pursuit Ship models used by the Federation, but even so conditions on board _Vespasian_ were cramped. Not only for the crew in the control cabin, but for the troops crammed into the rear compartments - More than a dozen heavily-armed troopers of the Unified Systems fleet. They wore dark uniforms with sleek, breath-masked helmets reminiscent of those iconic enforcers of Federation rule before the war, and sat still, strapped into bench seats along the bulkheads. Ready for combat.

"How long now...?" asked Commander Nic Haryl irritably. He shouldn't have to ask for regular reports - he should receive them as a matter of course. He would dearly love to have a Mutoid crew like his predecessors in the Federation Space Service, or indeed like his soon-to-be opponent Darvin, but had to make do with these commercial pilots - attracted by a generous bounty to serve in the growing UniS fleet but still disinclined to accept the kind of military discipline he favored.

 _Still_ , before long, they would have no choice.

"Closing..." one of them deigned to report at last. "Almost in visual range..."

"They haven't seen us...?"

"No indication of that, Commander... On course..."

"Good."

"Dispatches packeted and sent" said the navigator.

"What...? Don't just do these things without my order."

"Standard procedure, sir. Admiralty to be informed before enemy is engaged. Do you want to wait for a response?"

"No" Haryl said, staring at the navigator intently. "No, I don't want to do that."

* * *

Mara perched on the edge of the bed in Revenant's sickbay, and took the plasticup Darvin offered her. Swirling the contents around, she looked at it dubiously - the pale blue liquid with undissolved powder congealing on the surface wasn't exactly appealing.

"Get it down" said Darvin. "Last dose, I promise." Mara drank it in one go, and grimaced. "Now..." he said, sitting next to her. "If you want to know _ask_..." He gestured. "Go on, _ask_."

"All right. Why? Why Mutoids?"

"What's the alternative? _Kill them?_ " He looked at her steadily. "They're not a danger to any of us, and they can still serve a purpose. They were on this ship before I was, and as long as I'm in command there will always be a place for them... You get me...?"

"Yes."

"Where have you seen Mutoids before...?"

"On Gauda Prime. One of the gang bosses used them as enforcers."

"Oh yeah, which one...?"

"He called himself Rollo."

"Heard of him... Heard he died quite recently, in fact."

"He had information I needed. When I eventually got it, he didn't want to let us leave." As Darvin gave that some thought, peering at her assessingly, Mara looked away in a manner that was almost shy.

In the end, he laughed. "So... Mutoids. You think you might get used to them, given the chance?"

"I don't know... Do I need to?"

He stood up. "Maybe..." He was about to say something else, but at that moment something impacted against the ship and he was thrown off his feet. Dragging himself back up, he went straight to the comms panel.

"Rissa!"

_"Darvin - We're under attack!"_

He gasped incredulously. "Are we really?!"

* * *

The second missile, glowing an intense white in the black void, closed the gap between the two ships and only narrowly missed as Revenant took evasive action.

* * *

Rissa was bent over the pilot's station, concentrating intently, as Mara and Darvin arrived on the flight deck. "Did you get a fix on it?!" Darvin demanded as he sat.

"Not that time. Maybe when they fire again!"

"What could possibly go wrong with that plan...?! Lay down some suppressing fire!"

"We can't! They knocked out the servos! One and Three are down there now, they'll have the guns back on line any minute!"

"If we have a minute!" Darvin looked fiercely at Mara and Caul, mouth hanging open and eyes intense. "You guys up for helping out?"

"If the choice is that or we die..." said Caul.

"Good..." said Darvin. "Come with me..."

Rissa spun her chair around. "Darvin, think it through!"

"All right... Go with Rissa..." As he and Rissa swapped places and he took up the pilot seat, Darvin turned to address his second in command. "I'll feed you the co-ordinates through as soon as I can... Caul - Come up and sit here - You're on weapons now..." He was hurriedly replacing his hand with the alternative appendage from his belt, and plugged it onto a dedicated port in the front of the console - Now, with the ship ready to respond to direct commands from his brain, he was ready.

"You're with me..." Rissa said to Mara. "Time for some fun..."

* * *

The pursuit ship veered away from Revenant at the end of its attack run, and became invisible again both to the sensors and the naked eye. It would be back.

* * *

"How long do we have?" Mara asked as they ran aft along Revenant's service corridor.

"Just don't stop to pick flowers and we'll be fine!" said Rissa. "One - Weapons back on line...?"

"Yes, ma'am" replied another Mutoid - Like Two, she had once been a young woman until the ministrations of the Federation's cyber-surgeons, and her skin had the same greenish tinge and desiccated texture. She took up her station at a console that Mara could see was recently installed, definitely not an original feature of the frigate, as Rissa pulled three bracelets from a fixture on the wall nearby and bid her to put one on.

The bracelet was a band of dark grey metal, studded with lumps of some kind of red crystallized mineral. Clicking the device into place, Mara remembered the rescue from _Flame_ \- Vague, fragmentary, like a bad dream. She glanced at the bruising on her wrist where something had hastily been fastened around it - So, the bracelet was clearly necessary for the teleporter to function...

Next came a gun, as Rissa gave the other bracelet to One and led the way onto a small raised platform in the corner. "Who's going to transmit us...?"

" _It_ will..." said Rissa as another Mutoid - Three, presumably - came into view and calmly took One's place at the console. She, Mara and One stood ready on the pad...

 _"Standing by..."_ Darvin's voice crackled from a comms panel.

* * *

"Attacker on scanners now" said Two dispassionately. Darvin put his eyes to a scope jutting out of the panel in front of him.

"I see it..." He carefully manipulated the dial next to the scope and then flicked a switch to lock it in place. "Got it!" he said savagely, then spoke into the mic. "Rissa - I have a lock. We're sending you to the rear compartment on that thing. There won't be a lot of room, so crouch over a bit..."

* * *

Rissa, Mara and One obeyed Darvin's instruction, and Mara wiped the sweat off her hand onto the leg of her coverall. Rissa smiled at her, excitement palpable.

"Don't worry..." she said. "They don't know about this little toy yet. We'll be taking them by surprise..."

 _"You'll be alone in there..."_ Darvin's voice issued from the speaker. _"Fourteen all crammed together in neighboring compartment... Three in the one at the front..."_

"Seventeen..." pondered Mara. Three of them against seventeen...

"Hardly seems fair on them" grinned Rissa. "You all right, One...?"

One looked back at her impassively. "It is possible, ma'am, that I will experience adverse reaction to the process of matter transmission."

"Now you tell me. What kind of reaction? Based on what? Have Mutoids gone through a teleporter before...?"

"That information is not available."

"Right... Look, never mind. I'm sure it will be fine. What's a bit of a rash between acquaintances, eh...? As the twenty-credit-touch said to the Clone Master..."

"Ma'am."

* * *

"There!"

"Well done... Actually, _very_ well done..." said Darvin, as Caul fired off several shots and made the attacking ship alter its trajectory to avoid them, presenting more of its hull and allowing Darvin vital seconds to fix the co-ordinates for the teleporter. "You sure you haven't done this before...?" He leaned over the mic. "Rissa - Now...!"

* * *

With a white flash and a burst of static, Rissa, Mara and One appeared in the rear compartment of the attacking Pursuit Ship. Mara staggered momentarily - This was the first time she had been through this process conscious, and it was severely disorienting. She crouched in a defensive posture, gun ready.

"Watch the door." Rissa waved at the hatch leading to the forward compartments, as she unpacked a few items from the bag hitched to her belt. Even while she did as she was asked, Mara watched as the makings of a home-made explosive device were produced and assembled.

"Is that safe?"

" _Not in the least_. Watch the door."

"I am."

Rissa glanced over at One, and her eyes widened. "One...!" - Her voice was much louder than intended, and Mara heard movement in the next compartment - "Watch where you're pointing that!"

One was distracted, moving around groggily, and her gun had pointed at Rissa before veering off again unpredictably. Now, roughly in line with Mara, it fired. Mara threw herself to the side, heart thumping, as the blast impacted on the inner hull with a shower of sparks.

"One!" Rissa yelled, trying to concentrate on the explosive as well. "What are you doing?"

Mara got back up shakily, and threw herself against the hatch to secure it as someone from the forward compartment tried to get in. She watched One warily, and found herself face to face with the ailing Mutoid as she staggered over to stumble against her.

Rissa pressed the adhesive strip on the explosive against the hull and yelled into her bracelet - "Three - Teleport! Teleport now!" She watched, horrified, as One fell and took Mara with her and they struggled on the ground, resulting in both their bracelets coming off and clattering across the floor of the compartment.

"Hey!" a voice said from the forward compartment, and the door shook as they started firing at the lock. - They were coming through!

"Uh... Belay that, Three! Do not teleport! Repeat - Do not teleport!"

_"Teleporting now..."_

Realising what was about to happen, hampered by the gun, Rissa struggled to remove her own bracelet, but was too late as she suddenly fizzed and crackled out of existence. On the floor, Mara struggled to hold One at bay as she intensified her crazed, violent attack - The green face was millimetres away, eyes wide and teeth bared... Irrational, frenzied, unreachable...

Mara stretched out to try to retrieve her bracelet, but it was across the compartment and out of reach. Above it, she could see the timer on the explosive slowly getting closer to detonation...

More shots were fired, and the hatch swung open - Haryl led the way, several UniS soldiers behind him with their guns leveled. Taking in the situation, he yelled -

\- "Kill them!"


	6. Chapter 6

**A Federation prison, unknown location - 11 months after the massacre on Gauda Prime**

The heavy metal bolts were drawn back with a clang that reverberated down the long narrow corridor - The sound was still echoing as she started to move down it, heels clicking and adding to the sound, merging with it to curious effect.

This area was secured with heavy manual mechanisms because its sole prisoner could not possibly be trusted to a computer-controlled security system - She knew that - she had ordered that, but still the reality was slightly odd, like stepping back in time somehow.

This would be like stepping back in time in far more ways than just one.

She stopped, took a breath, steadying her nerves. The cell door was wrenched open for her by one of the guards, with a protesting squeal, and he stood back unobtrusively. _"Commissioner..."_

She entered.

The cell was large, even luxurious compared to the conditions Federation prisoners usually had to suffer, but even so she felt uncomfortable, on the edge of panic, almost as if she was the one enclosed here. Again, she forced herself to maintain her outward calm - She must show him not the faintest sign of weakness.

Not _him_.

He sat on his bunk, hands resting together on his lap, clad in loose tan-coloured prison fatigues. Sat in such a way that his face was hidden from her in shadow. She knew that was no accident.

They contemplated each other in silence for some time. "Have you had an opportunity to think...?" she said finally.

No reply.

"Of course you have. What else is there...?"

Still no reply. The prisoner did not even stir. She began to wonder if there was something wrong.

"Have you nothing to say...?" Her composure was not abandoned as such, but he had undeniably managed to rattle her slightly.

_"Nothing."_

She had started to turn away toward the door, but the sound of his voice made her stop. "So..." she said. "At last we can talk."

 _"These are old walls..."_ he said slowly, voice gravelly, patting the centuries-old bricks with one hand.

She actually smiled in response, caught off guard. "Yes..."

_"You got everything you wanted."_

"You really think that?"

_"Well... Perhaps not quite everything. You want to know where Orac is..."_

"To begin with..."

 _"Then perhaps, Servalan..."_ said Avon, leaning forward to bring his face into the light, "It is time for you to learn the lesson you are so skilled in brutally bringing home to others..." - He smiled, the same cold smile he had shown eleven months ago to the soldiers he had assumed were his executioners - "You can't always get _everything_ you want."

* * *

**Pelios -** **26.2 years later...** **  
**

Getting away from the Habitat unnoticed was not hugely difficult. Mara simply put on her old coveralls and blended into the chaos of the lower levels - Amid the noise and commotion of the Cees' marketplace, she soon found a foraging party in the process of being recruited, and discreetly joined it.

How soon she would be missed, and what the consequences might be, was another matter.

After a short distance, she discarded her carrying basket - near the main paths so it could be found again - and ventured into the narrower routes that led deeper into the jungle. Soon enough, she was off the commonly traversed routes and into the deep jungle. So far, so easy - She did not delude herself that it would remain so.

The route was easy - following it, not so much, due to the dense foliage and the lack of beaten paths. Plus her natural caution, knowing as she did a little of the dangers in this place. So it was closer to day's end than she would have liked when she reached the crash site - There was no such thing as _night_ , as such, on the equatorial band of Pelios, but as two of the suns dipped below the horizon, a form of twilight did descend, and that was generally the cue for a lot of the jungle's most dangerous creatures to emerge and hunt.

Approaching the site, there wasn't much to indicate that anything out of the ordinary had happened here till she got very close She noticed that a lot of the foliage was sparser and indeed newer, and could trace a rough line of what must at some time have been totally devastated terrain. Probably little if anything had grown along that line for years after the crash, but in the longer run there was no stopping the remorseless encroachment of the jungle.

Her head snapped round at a sudden noise, and she watched and listened intently. Nothing. Then it was heard again behind her, and she dropped to the ground as something launched itself at her from behind. She slashed out blindly with her heavy knife, and a shriek was heard as something dark and very quick-moving disappeared again into cover. A few telltale drops of blue-green fluid on the ground told her that the knife had found its target, if only glancingly.

Heart thumping in her chest, she stayed where she was for what seemed like a very long time, before deciding to move on.

* * *

There did not appear to be much left of the ship when she found it, mostly buried and obscured by foliage. With some difficulty, she climbed up the green-shrouded hull and found a rip in the side that allowed her access. The interior presented all-new challenges, with the deck at an almost forty degree angle, but somehow she managed to perform a cursory search. She was of course not the first one to come here - Alek's investigation team had combed it thoroughly, and no doubt taken much away with them that would have been illuminating.

Throughout her search, Mara was aware of _them_ , and was gradually steeling herself to approach the two bodies. When at last she had run out of anything else to investigate, she finally went over to them.

One of them was wedged between the bulkhead and a detached control console - Perhaps she - it _was_ a woman, Mara was fairly sure - had been crushed between them, or else trapped there and died afterward. A few fragments of parchment-thin skin clung to what was left of the skull, and some wisps of brown hair. Her black flight jumpsuit was almost intact, albeit caked in grime, but inspecting it for any name badges, company logos or military insignia yielded nothing.

 _"Mama...?"_ She didn't actually expect an answer, of course, but it still seemed a pertinent question to ask, quietly, in that moment.

It was the man's turn to be inspected next. He was on the floor, and thus gravity had put him at the very bottom of the ship, and she had to climb down to approach him very carefully.

He had been a big man, and he was resting with one leg bent underneath his body, the other jutting out in front of him along the bulkhead. He had a similar flight-suit to that of the woman but his was sleeveless, worn over a once-white shirt with wide sleeves. His mane of curly brown hair was almost all still there, but the face was a gaping ruin - Perhaps the crash, perhaps the work of a visiting animal at some point in the near three decades since. He had an empty holster at his side, and a pouch that was also empty.

_"Who were you...?"_

Mara climbed back up and found somewhere she could crouch at rest, and again had a good look around. The ship was a wreck - Anything of consequence had been stripped. She had probably wasted her time, and invited ruin on herself and whatever prospects she had once had. All for nothing.

* * *

Her return journey began with a wide detour as she walked fully round the crash site before venturing back the way she had come. It was during that detour that she saw it. Hanging from one of the trees, what she took at first glance to be some kind of liana, but at slightly closer inspection through her eyepiece was clearly made of some artificial material.

A length of some kind of woven plasti. A support strap, or perhaps a restraint of some kind... A safety-belt... Could it possibly be...?

A search of the area beneath the tree soon yielded more information. With some difficulty, using her knife to hack away the encroaching foliage, Mara dug out the remaining fragments of the chair. Like one of those from the interior of the ship, but ripped and corroded even more by the hostile environment of the jungle. Solid and real, and unsettlingly familiar.

She _had_ been here before.

She found something else, tangled up in the dangling remnant of the strap attached to the chair. A somewhat cumbersome handheld device, the controls partly corroded away, the text long since gone along with most of the mauve paintwork on the sides. Something made Mara activate what seemed to be the on/off switch and, remarkably, it still held some residual power. She felt the faint vibration in her hand as the device came on, and her finger was drawn toward one control that seemed to stand out from the others, as she idly wondered what would happen if she...

_No._

She threw the device away into the undergrowth where she had found it. There were no leads there.

* * *

Caul B could not remember a day more unusual than this one. Many days proceeded quite satisfactorily without him actually conversing with another human, in fact most of them did, so for him to have _two_ visitors to his workstation was unheard of.

"Let's take a walk..." said Alek A, ushering him reluctantly away - As Caul gestured behind him, he added "Don't worry. They won't question _me_... The Bees that is... I wish I could say that for everyone..." - That last part seemed to be addressed only to himself, so Caul did not query it - "Caul, isn't it...?" said Alek, knowing perfectly well it was.

"Yes."

"I'll come right to the point, Caul... I know she came to you. I also know what she wanted, and I know you gave it to her... Some kind of cheat, am I right...?"

"Right... I mean, no. I mean... Can I go back to work now...?" Caul was confused, not least by Alek's abstract leaps - First confirming he knew everything, then asking for confirmation of his guesses... He felt sure it was some kind of trap, or test, but if there was a safe way through this line of questioning Caul could not see it.

"You're not in trouble, at least... Not from me... I just..." Alek seemed weary now, and rubbed his hands over his eyes. "Listen, I know what I must do, but I can't do it alone... Will you help me...?"

 _Insufficient data_ , Caul thought, and resisted the urge to laugh - That would be inappropriate. At least he was fairly sure it would be. Maybe he should try a faint smile to test the water...

"You see... She has gone and put herself in a lot of danger, and it's... In a manner of speaking, it's my fault. I'm going out there after her, and I need someone to... Say something, lad."

Caul just stared at him warily.

"I've been trying to think why you would do what you have... Risk so much..." said Alek thoughtfully. "And can find only one explanation - You must _care_ about her..."

"I'm not sure... I'm the"-

-"Or is it just physical...?" Alek continued - Caul did not know where to look - "It's _fine_ , lad, it's _fine_... But whatever it is... Is it enough to make you take one more risk for her...?"

* * *

There was little more she could achieve here, and so Mara reluctantly set off back in the direction of the Habitat, lost in thought. So it was that she gave far less attention to the dangers of the jungle than she had on the way out, and when once again she heard a noise it was too late.

It was there ahead of her, at eye level barely a couple of metres away.

As she watched, mesmerised, it came slowly closer, appearing to float without visible support. An organic, bell-shaped _thing_ that seemed to open out as she watched, petals unfolding, glistening obscenely. As it weaved slowly as if to avoid a potential attack, its means of support became visible - it was on the end of a long, rope-like, jointed brown stem linking it to some other segment of itself hidden amid the foliage.

Some part of Mara's brain distantly and calmly identified the creature as a - curiously named, she thought - Dream Weaver. She knew little about it besides its name and the fact that it was extremely dangerous. She tried to remember exactly why, while remaining very still on the simple assumption that it would react adversely to movement.

Her knife was at her belt, and she knew she could not possibly reach it in time if the Dream Weaver decided to strike.

It struck.

* * *

**Revenant, deep space -** **6 months later...** **  
**

Rissa leaped off the pad in the teleport bay and over to the controls, shoving Three aside. "Bollock!" she yelled. "You're a bollock, Three! Don't worry, so am I...!" She was manipulating the controls feverishly. "No time, no time, no time...!"

"Ma'am?"

"You armed, Three...?"

"Of course."

"Good... That should help..."

* * *

"We can't sir!"

"What...?!"

 _Of course..._ a direct hit on any of the systems in here would be disastrous. Haryl racked his fevered brain as he took in the chaos that had overtaken his till-now perfect - ish - command. This was simply not fair! He had done everything right!

One looked up briefly, slavering in her insane rage, as Haryl came into the aft compartment, gun held out and aimed at her head. Then she ignored him, as if the threat he posed was irrelevant, continuing to press home her attack on Mara. Haryl, at a loss as to what else to do, stepped in boldly and slammed the butt of his gun against One's head. Again. And again.

The Mutoid rolled away to protect herself before coming back with a strangled bellow of animalistic fury- He shot her at close range, and One fell on top of him.

As he struggled out from underneath her, Mara used the time to snatch back her own gun, even as Haryl's men trained their weapons on her from the hatchway. She glanced at the timer on the bomb - How long did they have...? It could be mere seconds...!

"Don't!" Haryl shouted to his men. "How did you plan to escape?" he demanded of Mara. "You must have a way, you don't look like you're planning to die with us...!" He pointed his gun at her.

Mara looked over at her bracelet on the deck. Too far away...

"Well, one of us is going to have to do something..." Haryl said, with a note of hysteria in his voice. He had no idea at all what to do now... In desperation he turned to his men. "I'll keep her here. Contact _Titus_ and _Domitian_ \- Inform them - Break off attack - Transfer tube operation at once. Full evacuation of lead ship..."

"Sir."

"I don't think you'll have time for that" said Mara calmly. It really looked like this was it, for all of them, but she felt strangely calm. Then, a moment later, she started to feel very strange... Unsteady, she held her hand up in front of her and saw it start to ripple and dissolve...

"What's happening?!" screamed Haryl, undergoing the same strange effect, and yelped as a revived One pulled him down to the deck and tried to rip out his throat with her fingers. He crawled across the compartment with the Mutoid clinging to him, desperate for assistance. "Here...!" he squawked. "In here!"

Mara picked up her bracelet, and found it to be vibrating intensely, hot to the touch. Too hot! She dropped it at her feet.

The bomb entered the final few seconds before detonation...

Haryl, stuck half in and half out of the compartment, managed to briefly shake off One and struggle back in. He desperately kicked out at the homicidal Mutoid as she grabbed his leg... There was an almost blinding flash of light originating from the teleport bracelet...

The first explosion destroyed the rear compartment, and a chain reaction began which blew the rest of the Pursuit Ship into fragments - The fire instantly extinguished in the vacuum of space, the fragments continuing to disperse till nothing was left to show it had ever existed.

* * *

Rissa and Three trained their weapons on the teleport pad as it filled with shimmering energy, crackling and sparking. Finally, in an enveloping cloud of vapor, the whole system cut out, and they found themselves peering through the murk, trying to make out what, if anything, they had managed to get back.

Haryl was hysterical with terror as he crawled off the raised platform with One still hanging onto his leg, but it quickly became clear that the Mutoid was limp now, her furious aggressiveness gone. Mara emerged from the vapor as it dissipated, surprised to be greeted with a delighted hug by Rissa, and watched as Three approached the prone body of One and examined it.

There were no life signs, or whatever it was she might have been looking for, and Three looked over at them, head slightly to the side. Was it Mara's imagination, or was there something slightly accusing in her expression...?

"I'm sorry, Three."

 _"Two more Pursuit Ships, veering off now..."_ Darvin's voice crackled from the intercom. _"They don't want to fight. Rissa - Everyone all right down there...?"_

Her spirits subdued now, Rissa moved slowly to the wall panel. "All safe..." a glance at One's body. "Almost all. We have a prisoner... and a few questions."

"What did you do?" asked Mara.

"I widened the field on your bracelet as wide as it would go..." Rissa replied, throwing her arms out wide. "And I boosted the resolution _higher_ than it would go... Then I made a wish." Reaching down, she carefully looped the steaming, blackened bracelet around the barrel of her gun and lifted it off the pad - _"Bracelet down."_

* * *

Darvin watched on the scope as the two remaining Pursuit Ships - Retreat Ships, he supposed they were now - sped away. "There they go..." he said to Caul - "Speed - Time distort _We don't wanna play no more_...!"

"No, no, no...!" Caul said excitedly - "Time distort... fifty-seven...!" - Seeing Darvin's quizzical expression, he looked less certain - "Because it's impossible..."

Darvin just looked at him for a few seconds, before breaking out in a broad grin and slapping Caul's shoulder with his real hand.

* * *

Mara and Rissa watched as Two and Three picked up One's body and placed it on a stretcher to be removed to the lab. "You'd think they'd feel something..." Mara said quietly.

"No..." Rissa replied, busy recalibrating the teleport. "Not them. Think of them as tools... Voice activated, with advanced problem-solving skills, so really useful. But still just tools."

"They _were_ human."

" _Were_. That's right, and it's not my fault that happened to them - all right...?"

"All right. _Ma'am_."

Rissa smiled. "Sorry. It's just that they really, _really_ give me the creeps. Having a little fun with them sometimes makes them more bearable to be around."

"And Darvin?"

"He's bearable to be around, sure."

"Are you two...?"

"No...!" Rissa exclaimed. "He's... He's far, far more important to me than _that_. You understand?" - Mara nodded - "You and Caul..." she continued. "You...?"

"No." Mara seemed mildly surprised to be asked that, but her response was automatic. "A bit like you and Darvin, I suppose."

Rissa grunted casually in acknowledgment, busying herself putting back the inspection panel.

* * *

****A Federation prison, unknown location -** 20 months after the massacre on Gauda Prime**

"I knew it was you..."

"Of course. Who else could it be...? You were expecting another visitor...?"

" _Expecting_ , no..."

"Don't tell me you're losing your edge, Avon..."

_"I hope so."_

"Given up...? You...? Surely not."

"Have you come for a particular reason, Servalan...? Or just to _gloat_...?"

"I never gloat. You of all people should know that everything I do is for a very specific purpose... You find that amusing...?"

"...Others might believe you... But I..."

"Oh, do please continue..."

"I've always been able to see it."

"See what...? No, _do_ go on. This is fascinating."

"Remember I warned you... I gave you a chance..."

"Oh, what are you prattling"-

-"You're scared."

"What?" Her tone was dangerous now, rather than amused.

"You're terrified. More afraid, at every moment of the day and night - _especially_ night, I suspect... than anyone I've ever met. Everything you do is driven by"-

-"Stop it. Stop _now_..." she breathed.

"...Driven by raw... unadulterated... fear...! Oh, are you going...? _Stay_ , play a while longer..."

"I control this place, Avon. You would do well to remember that."

"I have a great deal of trouble forgetting anything. That's the problem."

"Goodbye, Avon. Perhaps I'll visit again. Someday."

"Servalan."

"What?"

"People who are in control don't constantly need to remind others of it... _Just a thought to take with you_."

" _Goodbye_ , Avon... _Oh_ , there _is_ just _one_ more thing..."

"I'm sure there is."

"You must be dying to know about a few things you left... shall we say, up in the air...? That mind of yours... so fertile with plan upon plan. Plan within plan. For every one that goes wrong, a backup."

_"Backup..."_

"Yes, and you thought I didn't know about one of your little... _backups_ , didn't you...? One last little beam of hope... Well, I'm afraid it has been shot down in flames... Quite literally, as a matter of fact."

_"I see."_

"I never forgot he was out there, you see... Well, how could I...? He held my life in his hands. Yours also. _Well_ , not any more."

"I'm so glad you're happy."

"I've been keeping that one to myself for some time now... Just waiting for the right moment to share it with you."

"I hope someday I'll be able to fully demonstrate my gratitude."

"I'm sure you do... See you soon. Well, _soon_ is a matter of perspective..."

"Goodbye, Servalan."

"Goodbye... Kerr."

* * *

**Pelios**

The ship shuddered uncontrollably as it entered the atmosphere, and the heat in the control section climbed and climbed. The pilot kept his voice calm, like a man thoroughly inured to danger, but his grip on the controls was tight enough to make his knuckles go white. "Losing altitude..." he said, putting it somewhat mildly. "I think it's safe to say this _isn't_ Xenon Base..."

 _"That was deliberate"_ his co-pilot said again, her voice considerably less calm. "He waited at these co-ordinates, and had us shot down...!"

"We don't know that. Any number of things could have gone wrong..."

"We _do_..." she said savagely. "Well, he asked for this...! I'm going to use it."

"No...!" The pilot was distracted from the controls in futilely trying to stop her as she ventured away from the control desk and returned swiftly with the device. She stood ready, hand poised above the controls -

_\- "I'll do it..." -  
_

"No, you won't..." he said gently, knowing it was the truth. So did she. That was when she started crying, silently.

Three minutes later, they both died.

* * *

Alek A looked up at the sound, only mildly curious at first. Unusual, certainly, but the day this jungle threw no surprising sights, sounds or indeed smells at him was a day he considered himself unlikely to see. _Still_ , it sounded like it was coming from above...

 _Oh, very well then..._ With some effort due to his injured leg, he got up from where he had been crouching to gather his samples, and walked until he could find enough of a gap in the overhanging trees to look up.

The trail hung in the sky far above, descending toward the ground - The fiery object producing it hurtled out of control toward the ground with a horrible inevitability. Alek cringed at the thought of the imminent impact. His face drained of colour as the thought occurred, _What if it has a fusion engine...?_

 _Well_ , he thought, _If it has there's no way I can get clear in time anyway_... He shrugged. Might as well start heading that way, and hope to give the survivors - _possible survivors_ \- some assistance. The crash would be observed back at the Habitat, but knowing them it would take hours or days to even debate the possibility of sending help. He could get there in an hour or two if he hurried.

Hurry he did, as much as his damned leg would allow - All right, he should take to carrying a stick, as _she_ recommended - _Dorra, old son, allow her the dignity of a name, even if... -_ but it still rankled. He was only forty-seven, and on a level plane he could walk as well as anyone, and even outrun quite a few of the stiffs from whom he took his orders.

This, of course, was not a level plane.

It ended up taking closer to three hours than two, and as he got there, he realised with regret that he might as well not have bothered being in such a hurry - In all the excitement, he had forgotten about the sort of heat a thing like that would generate as it passed through the atmosphere. At least he had no trouble finding it - The plume of smoke was visible for miles around.

As he got close - as close as he dared for now - he noticed the great rent in the hull of the ship, and sighed... So much for survivors. The inside of that thing would be a baking chamber... Unless, of course, the crew were sealed in an airtight compartment, which was quite possible...

He stumbled on his approach to the ship, and reached out a hand to steady himself - and snatched it back as the thing he had touched recoiled violently! It reared up and faced him, and Alek stared into its... Face...? Can a plant have a face...? His mind dulled, his body off-balance, he could do little but watch as the thing opened out like a flower...

He felt a fine spray on his face, and the creature moved back and retreated on its long stem and disappeared into the foliage.

To wait.

His blood chilled as he realised what this creature was. He felt the thin film of fluid on his face, already drying, start to faintly sting... _Whatever you do, watch out for Dream Weavers... Don't worry, you only get them in the deep jungle, but all the same if you venture off the paths, watch out..._

He should have paid more attention.

* * *

 _"I know what happened to her..."_ he had told Dorra once. _"...Our girl. I found out."_

It was during one of their interminable meetings on some tedious matter of routine procedure, and he had just said it. Said what was on his mind, for once. She hadn't responded for a while, and he had begun to wonder, briefly, if she had heard.

That seemed unlikely. She no doubt wanted him to think that, but the way her mouth puckered showed anyone who knew her well enough - him, basically - that she was annoyed. He knew that pressing together of the lips and the down-turned sides... and hated it. Or...

No, he really hated it. Not that he had always found that mouth so ill-favored, by any means... _Still. Enough of that._

 _"Why..."_ she asked in a quiet voice, _"would you think I wanted to hear that...?"_

 _"She died."_ There it was.

_"Still less, why would you think I wanted to know that?"_

_"It's a fact."_

_"So is the unacceptable protein yield in this month's reports."_

_"You heard what I said...? Our girl. Our daughter. She only lived a few months."_

_"That is unfortunate."_ Dorra continued skimming the reports. _"But I'm sure, had there been any need for us to know, we would have been told..."_ He found himself looking at her hand, at the finger that traced a line down the smooth surface of the pad - Normally so steady, now trembling slightly.

_"I just thought... If I know, you should know too."_

_"Well, in that case..."_ she replied. _"Thank you. Now, can we get on?"_

_"Of course."_

They never mentioned it again.

* * *

Alek struggled through the undergrowth as fast as he could, crawling when he stumbled, struggling back to his feet with a tremendous and agonising effort. He had to get away. As far as possible. It was his only hope. While he still retained the wits to escape, before the creature... The Dream Weaver...

_No!_

He struggled awake, struggled to lift himself off the ground. Rose to his feet, ignoring the explosion of agony in his leg as he placed weight on it. _Move...!_

 _"We've already gone on far too long..."_ she had said - _Dorra_ had said - _"What if someone finds out...?" -_ _"What if they do...?"_ Alek had snorted, although he had learned since then...

"You're made of ice!" he called. "Made of... ice!" Did she not understand...? Did she not...? How much it hurt...!

 _Wake up!_ He forced himself to keep going, and staggered in a circle, then a further, smaller, circle. Then the smallest yet, just before he fell. No, that would have to do. He felt like he weighed more than the entire structure of the Habitat, and he could go on no longer. That... would have to do. They couldn't complain... He had done his best...

_"Mama...!"_

The voice cut into his consciousness like a knife, and Alek awoke. Moments later, his mind became cloudy again...

 _"Mama...!"_ Then something he couldn't make out... something like _"Back...!"_ - _"Bake...?"_

He struggled once more to his feet, hands on the ground, admiring how the foliage had suddenly become so wonderfully, delightfully, soft, and how it melted and so seamlessly merged and absorbed into his hands... Into his very being... It was a part of him - The whole jungle... and he of it...

_"Mama...! Bake...!"_

He saw her then, and all thoughts of sleep were abandoned. Perhaps, indeed, he was already asleep. Perhaps his body even now was being approached by the Dream Weaver, this time bringing its vulnerable digestion sac out of hiding to feed... It was worth it... To die was nothing, if it meant getting to see his girl again...

There she was, up in the tree. _His girl_. _Somehow_ , she had come back...

She was terrified, staring out at the jungle, tearful eyes wide... Then she looked down. At him.

Their eyes locked.

She was suddenly calm, and stopped frantically thrashing around in the chair... Thoughts of sleep, of abandoning the fight, were thrown aside forever as he understood the trust that had just been placed in him.

That strap looked like it was going to break at any moment... Strange, he could feel his mind starting to clear... Perhaps it was the adrenaline... If only it could clear without the accompaniment of this pounding headache... Alek started to think, as lucidly as he was able, about how he was going to get her down...

* * *

The spires of the Habitat were in sight at last. He sprinted the last few hundred metres to safety, oblivious to the pain in his leg, carrying the girl-child in his arms - shielding her as far as possible with his body.

The girl from the dream. His dream. The girl came from his dream-state, but she was real and solid, and soon others would see her too - Alek didn't entirely know how he felt about that, even as his clouded wits continued to reassert themselves.

She had been plucked from his dream. That one idea lingered, a notion that even now he found it impossible to dismiss. Somehow he felt this girl would always be the living embodiment of a dream - Just as he knew that whatever name she might once have had was now irrelevant...

 _"Mara..."_ he said softly. "Don't worry... We're nearly there... Nearly home."

* * *

****A Federation prison, unknown location -** 8.5 years after the massacre on Gauda Prime**

"Avon... Why did you kill Blake...?"

"Where have you been?"

"I asked you a question."

"So did I."

"I _have_ to know."

"Several potential answers come to mind, to explain the unusually long gap between visits. _One_ \- a deliberate strategy. A compelling possibility, but not the one I'm leaning toward. _Two_ \- You'd forgotten I was here. Forgive me if I find it easy to dismiss that possibility very quickly. _Three_..."

"If you have a point, please get to it."

" _Three_... Something else has been taking up most of your time. Something more urgent than your need to gloat, your need to find Orac, your need to eliminate all - shall we say, _unfinished business_ \- Needless to say, this is the one I _am_ leaning toward..."

"Why kill him?!"

He looked directly at her for the first time in years, and there was a long pause. He shrugged. "Why not?"

"That is not good enough."

"So, with that established, the question becomes... What could possibly prevent you from indulging your favorite pastime... You have found an even more fulfilling one...? Doubtful. You have found Orac, without my help... _Extremely_ doubtful. You have been forced to spend every moment staving off disaster... A threat so overwhelming, so dire, that you - _You_ \- have finally run out of solutions... An existential threat to your entire empire..."

"Which of the guards told you? I'll have his tongue removed."

"They are almost as isolated as I am, you know... Have a little _empathy_..." The idea of that made him chuckle.

"They're back."

"Ambiguity does not become you, Servalan."

"The Andromedans... They have returned. It's far, far worse than before... Is that sufficiently unambiguous?"

"Just."

"So?"

"What do you expect me to do about it?"

"Anything you can! You think they will just leave you alone when they find you? Their vanguard kept them well informed, all those years ago, before the last of them were destroyed. They _know_ who you are..."

"And where to find me...?"

"Not yet. But that could be arranged."

"Good... I was beginning to worry you had... How to put it... Lost your edge."

"Don't push it, Avon..."

"Why not...?" That was pitched as a genuine question.

"Is that your answer to everything now...?"

"Why did you want to know why I killed him...? Why is it so important now, after all this time...?"

"Because I need to know if I can trust you."

He raised both eyebrows. "You're serious."

"Blake trusted you..."

"Yes. But then... He was always doing things like that. I used to advise him against it..." He smiled faintly as he mused, then his face became neutral once more - "You know my price" he added abruptly.

"No."

_"No deal."_

"Haggle."

"My price is _fixed_ , Servalan. The question is... Are you willing to _rise_ to it...?"


	7. Chapter 7

**(Relevant extracts follow from the annals of the August Siblinghood of Morphenniel; Data adjunct 593A - The Federation Falls: From the Ashes... An Albatross)**

****...** **

****The 3rd century of the 2nd calendar** **

******...** ** **

**93rd/94th year**

Despite the massive loss of life, the immediate aftermath of the Second Intergalactic War was not actually quite such a chaotic time as might be supposed - at least for the Core Federation systems. There is evidence aplenty that local authorities in most surviving sectors managed to keep control of resource distribution and basic order, and little evidence of violent unrest. With their military machine to all intents and purposes destroyed, however, and even the most optimistic projections estimating full recovery more than 10 years away, it was clear that the Federation was finished.

The quiet disappearance of Sleer, the mysterious figure who had dominated the Administration in its final decade - just as calls to try her for war crimes were gaining traction - was in retrospect seen as the ultimate admission that this really _was_ the end.

******...** ** **

**95th/96th** **year**

Elements both within and outside the old Administration - members of the Cabinet, senior military figures, and even one of the famed resistance leaders who had done much to slow the advance of the Federation at its peak - put aside their differences in search of a new model for the future, and came together at the head of a new, altogether looser federation (though that word was to be avoided at all costs). The Unified Systems Alliance was born - Before long the Alliance part of the name was dropped for somewhat obscure reasons (see appendix 141-5680-subsection 1C) and it became known more simply as Unified Systems (UniS).

So what went wrong...?

******...** ** **

****(Data retrieval interrupted. Exiting backdoor... Deleting data retrieval signets... Deleted)** **

* * *

If the accompanying warships were in outline reminiscent of sharks and crocodiles, the Unified Systems flagship was more like a whale - _Leviathan_ was designed more for its ability to overawe an opponent than to outmaneuver them, and to accommodate the extensive staff of a UniS Admiral on top of the 1,000 strong crew. The Admiral in this case was a sidelined, even perhaps _irrelevant_ figure - ousted from his luxurious quarters and forced to requisition those of the Captain, and so on down the line, in favour of the current occupant of the Admiral's suite.

The President himself.

Sol Brintun waited in the ante-room, less than patiently. In conspicuous comfort, certainly, but no amount of plush antique furniture could make up for the sour feeling in the pit of his stomach. As he sat here, half a galaxy away his carefully-nurtured plans were in dire peril of being brought to ruin... and he was being kept waiting.

"You made sure of impressing on the President the extreme urgency of this matter...?" he barked at a passing servant. From the angle the servant viewed him from, Brintun's eyes were magnified considerably by his glasses, and his unblinking stare was decidedly unsettling. The bead of sweat gathering over his left eyebrow was magnified too.

The tall, thin young man looked down at him somewhat sniffily. "The President will see you, sir, as soon as he is able..." he said, before scampering aft back to the day-cabin, and Brintun resolved he would be added to The List as soon as he had leisure. Clearly he had little idea of just who Brintun was - just as many did not recognise the true importance of the President's Advisor-without-portfolio - but he soon would.

Brintun waited. And fretted. And sweated heavily.

* * *

When Brintun finally lost patience and walked into the day-cabin without announcement there was, briefly, silence, as if those in attendance could not quite believe anyone would have the temerity to come in without escort or invitation. The soft murmuring of voices and tinkling of exotic music quickly resumed, however, as it became clear there was to be no eruption of rage, no dire consequences for Brintun, or for anyone unlucky enough to be close by.

For now, at least...

 _"Sol..."_ said a low voice, and a huge liver-spotted hand beckoned. "Come here, come here... You wanna drink...?" A chuckle of restrained amusement. "No, of course you don't..."

President Scarn got up from the couch he had been lounging on, with some difficulty, and some of the scantily-dressed young men and women in attendance looked up again, briefly, in their surprise - For the President to rise to meet a visitor was a rare thing indeed. _This_ kind of visitor, anyway.

"I have been waiting outside for some time. I don't think you realise"-

-"Wait" said Scarn firmly, clicking his fingers and a moment later accepting the resulting cup of wine without further acknowledgement. "Not in front of _them_."

He was an imposing figure, tall and extremely broad and powerful-looking, even accounting for his age and the rolls of fat that were visible beneath his loose-fitting, opulent garments - His full head of greying hair was sculpted, in the fashion of the Proximan nobility from which he had sprung, into several tall waxed spikes. He draped his great slab of an arm around Brintun's more wiry form and brought him to the other side of the vast day-cabin, to an ornate conference table surrounded by impressive high-backed chairs.

They both sat, and Scarn rested his massive forearms on the table, hands clasped together. "Now."

"You know that the Flavian Pursuit ship squadron recently encountered one of _her_ ships, and tried to destroy it..."

"Tried, yes. Didn't succeed."

"Fortunately."

"Some idiot of a Commander, Faryl or something..."

"Haryl."

"Well, if he isn't already dead, I'll have him killed." Scarn's train of thought moved on. "I dunno, _maybe_ it would be a good thing. We've been following this plan of yours for, how long now...? And no nearer"-

-"Exactly" Brintun interrupted, knowing he was the only man in existence who could safely do so. "The plan. To abandon it just as it reaches fruition would be utter folly."

"Bold words, sir."

"I thought that was why you needed me."

"Bolder still..." Scarn playfully knocked one huge hand against the side of Brintun's head, to his obvious annoyance. "It's a good thing I like you..." He wiped Brintun's sweat off his hand onto the hem of his tunic. " _Well_... Y'know what I mean."

"It is _almost_ time to move against Orella, yes... but important to remember the reasons why we are moving against her in the first place. If we play this very carefully... She will lead us to _him._ "

"Ah yes..." Scarn sat back. "You're right, Sol. Quite right." His fingers drummed loudly on the tabletop. "Good thing that ship wasn't destroyed." His eyes narrowed. "Where is he, Sol...? Tell me _that_..."

Brintun met the President's eye steadily. " _That_ we will find out."

"Where are you...?" the President mused quietly. _"Avon..."_

* * *

**Revenant, deep space  
**

"It was my fault..." said Darvin quietly.

"How so...?" asked Rissa, taking the printout from him and skimming over the data. "Sorry, not seeing it..." The two of them were in _Revenant_ 's medical lab, trying not to look at the now-shrouded remains of One on the autopsy table. Three, cleaning up, studiously ignored them.

"You won't find it in there..." said Darvin, rubbing his face with his real hand. "I should have known...!"

"Known what?"

"When they installed that teleport thing, one of those guys was an old-timer, he worked on the - whad'yamacallit... Aquitar project, a sort of precursor..."

"Didn't go so well, I heard..."

"Well, yeah... But the thing is, apparently in the early stages of human testing they tried it out with Mutoids..."

She shrugged. "Makes sense to me..."

"Yes. But the point is, it stopped after that. The whole project. Even though the results up to that point had been so promising, and the expense already incurred was huge..."

"Why...?"

"The guy didn't know exactly, but he'd heard rumors..."

"The Mutoids _went_..."

"...Exactly."

Rissa studied the printout again. "So the teleport disrupts the Mutoids' programming..."

"More than that, it totally destroys the organic material protecting the electronic components in the brain from rejection... Basically, it _scrambles_ their brains... I should have listened... Taken it seriously... Never put one of the Mutoids through that thing."

"And..." Rissa mused, "If just Mara and me had gone through, we'd have been in and out quickly - Job done..." - Darvin looked at her as if to say _Thanks for pointing that out -_ "Well..." she continued. "You're the ship's captain..." She slapped him on the shoulder as she moved to the exit. _"Not a god."_

"Who says...?"

* * *

Mara avoided the captured officer's gaze whenever he glanced over at her - She just, as Darvin had asked her to, made sure he stayed where he was.

The prisoner sat at a table bolted to the deck in _Revenant_ 's brig - They were surrounded on three sides by the confinement cells, and Mara guessed this had been the guards' duty area - Darvin, for whatever reason, did not use the cells, so here she was, gun ready in her holster, standing with the prisoner in her line of sight. Bored, but alert all the same.

It was still better than Pelios.

Commander Nic Haryl tried his best not to fidget, not to sweat, not to show the girl any sign of weakness, but the very strenuous effort he put into that manifested itself mainly as... fidgeting, sweating and looking weak. The fact that his fine straight blond hair was coming free from its pomade and starting to fall down around his face was not helping his attempts to maintain his dignity.

How could he have allowed this to happen...? Three Pursuit Ships - cream of the new Unified Systems fleet - and he had allowed a clapped-out old Federation frigate with a skeleton crew to best him. How...?

Darvin came in, and sat down opposite Haryl. The two of them regarded each other for a long moment.

"You..." Darvin said, pointing with his artificial hand - "You have severely inconvenienced me... You know that...?"

"Good."

Darvin sneered in disdain. "And as for your tactics - All right, the basic two-pronged attack is a classic, never gets old... But _you're_ supposed to stand well back till the outcome is as near-certain as it can be... Who were you trying to impress...? Who taught you"-

-"You did... _sir_."

 _"Oh..."_ Darvin sat back, casting a brief glance At Mara off to the side - She had suddenly taken a keen interest in the interrogation - "You were at the Academy..."

"Yes."

"I used to train cadets..." Darvin explained to Mara.

" _Federation officer_ cadets..." Haryl said, having identified a weakness, unable quite to believe his luck.

"That's right..." Darvin confirmed grudgingly.

"While you were recovering... _sir_."

"Of course..." Darvin said, anger starting to show, " _I_ don't remember _you_..."

"I dare say you don't, _sir_."

"You must have been young..." Darvin mused. He judged Haryl to be mid-thirties at the very most. Probably younger.

"Last intake. _Sir_."

"Oh..." Darvin felt on firmer ground now, and even started to enjoy this again - " _Bad luck_. Joined just as it was all coming to an end, eh...?"

"Fortunately there ended up being... other options for candidates with the correct skills and qualities. _Sir_."

" _Or_ whoever they could get... Unified Systems, eh...? Nice idea at the beginning... But look what happened. Federation in all but name, but a lot less competent..."

"Is this supposed to be an interrogation, sir...? Because I seem to be finding out more than you are..." He glanced over at Mara and winked.

Darvin chuckled at that. " _Yeah_... You're _in_ there. You know, if you had a bit of charm about you, that might not be _quite_ so amusing... _And_ if you hadn't soiled yourself at the first sight of an angry Mutoid..."

"Yes... What _did_ go wrong there, sir...? Not having trouble with your crew, are you, sir...?"

"Don't you worry, son. Just don't you worry. About anything..." Darvin was genuinely menacing now. "You've no need to worry. _Ever again_."

Haryl sneered at that, while looking a little confused and fearful. Even more so as Darvin stood up, moved over to Mara and gave her his sidearm. "Take this, Mara... It's set to kill" - She looked at him, features carefully blank, but wondering what he was doing - "I'll be outside."

With that, he left. Mara moved forward, and at length raised the gun to aim it at Haryl's head.

"What is this...?" Haryl gasped - "I'm supposed to fall for this, am I...? Some sort of trick... It's pathetic..." - He became increasingly distressed - " _You're_ pathetic. Wouldn't last a minute where I've come from..." - His breathing was loud and somewhat hoarse as he prepared himself - "Well, do it then... Do it! Just kill me...!"

Mara had just listened to him calmly the whole time, gun level - Finally, she spoke. "I... _thought_ I was going to. I thought, _why not_...?" She lowered the gun. "But no. Just... _no_."

* * *

In the corridor outside, Mara passed the waiting Darvin silently, glancing at him only briefly as she returned his gun. He looked down at it in his hand, and smiled faintly.

* * *

Haryl was trying to control his breathing and ward off the advanced panic attack he was experiencing when Darvin came in again - His head snapped round, and he regarded Darvin like a cornered animal as _Revenant_ 's captain raised the gun.

He jumped in his seat as a loud click was heard. No shot was fired.

Darvin moved closer, and loomed imposingly over the table and the terrified prisoner. _"I wouldn't do it either..."_ he said quietly. Then raised his voice. "I wouldn't either...!" - His eyes were blazing - "You got that...?!"

Haryl was left alone for a short time to contemplate it.

* * *

"All right, laddo..." Rissa called as she entered the bridge - Caul jumped up from the central chair, startled - "You... Are... _Relieved_."

"Thanks..." Putting on the battered dark-red leather jacket he had acquired on Gauda Prime, Caul made to leave.

"Though you don't look very relieved... Oh, and that's _thanks, sir_..."

"Oh. Sorry. _Sir_."

"I'm just joking. You don't need to call anybody sir. _Ever_. Though, don't tell him I mentioned it, I think Darvin secretly _would_ like it."

"Right..." Looking like he had no idea how to extricate himself from this conversation, and would far rather be pinned down somewhere under heavy fire, Caul edged slowly toward the door.

"Anyway..." Rissa continued. "Speaking of, he's asked if you would take a look at the interface between Revenant's main systems and the teleport. After what I did to it, he's not risking it again till the whole thing is thoroughly checked out, and you... Well, you seem to have an affinity... _Hey_ , I'm good at making messes that you can fix... Obviously meant to be..."

"I'll go _now_..." he said amenably, looking directly at her for the first time since she had come in, and gave a small wave as he made for the door.

"Oh, one more thing..." - He turned again to face her - "Like I say, you seem to have an affinity with all this stuff... I have a problem... Nothing too vital, but the door to my quarters keeps jamming just short of being closed... You're scheduled for rack time later, same as me, and I wondered if you would just take a look at it as you pass... You know, on the way to _your_ quarters..."

"Yes... Of course I will." Was _that_ all she wanted...? It seemed straightforward enough. He even smiled a little.

"I mean, if you're too tired by then... Or it's not your area... That's fine. It's just, I know how useful those hands of yours are... _Just thought_..."

"No, not a problem. I can do that."

" _Thanks_ , Caul..."

"No problem."

As the doors closed behind him, Rissa turned to the control desk and smiled.

* * *

**Pelios - 6 months earlier  
**

The first thing Alek did was fashion a staff, a sturdy length of wood to support some of his weight, as he and Caul embarked on their trek into the jungle. The route he had _never_ forgotten, even if the terrain was even more difficult than he remembered - or was his body just less responsive? - and so several hot, uncomfortable hours later they neared their destination.

"This is it, I'm sure..." he said, planting his staff in the ground. "It was somewhere near here..." He cursed himself for not anticipating that the jungle would have thoroughly hidden the wrecked ship in the intervening years.

Caul climbed a tree to the first set of branches. Out of breath, he looked in every direction, and Alek found the wait unbearable until, at last, the younger man looked down.

"Have you found it?" he demanded. Caul was about to point, lost his grip on the tree and struggled to retain it. "All right, come down..." Alek said testily. "Just... _come down_."

* * *

Again, Alek found himself waiting, looking up at Caul as he climbed, this time up the partially-exposed side of the crashed ship to the wide rent in the hull. So focused was he that when he heard the faintest sound behind him, and turned, heart suddenly hammering against the inside of his chest, it was far too late to make any difference.

The face, if it could be called that, of the Dream Weaver was so close to his own that it occupied most of his vision. He felt a strange form of calm descend as he realised... He _had_ been living on borrowed time, after all...

_No..._

There was no Dream Weaver in front of him. Just the head of one, held up toward him... Held by...

Mara looked at him, her face impassive. " _Sorry_..." she said coldly. "Did I startle you...?"

He snorted. "I suppose I _did_ deserve that."

Mara held the piece of Dream Weaver up and showed him the end of the fragment of stem still attached to it, hacked through after several attempts with her knife. "It couldn't have done much _to_ you, anyway..." she said. "It's body is crushed underneath the ship... These _feeders_ seem to operate independently, and have been uselessly trying to feed a non-existent host for decades... Long since run out of poison though... Fortunately for me."

She smiled, but it was a cold smile, devoid of warmth. They looked at each other for a long moment. "I'm sorry..." he said.

"What for...?"

"Anything you want me to be sorry for."

That provoked a genuine smile, if a somewhat half-hearted one. She looked over at the crashed ship. "Should we get Caul down from there?"

"You go. Let this tired old body rest... and then..."

She had started to move toward the ship, but turned back. "And then...?"

"And then..." Alek said, eyes closed. "I'll tell you _everything_..."

* * *

 _Star Maiden_ stayed behind for now, hidden, while some of the smaller ships of the fleet, those most suited to the task ahead, returned to sub-light speed well inside the star system - Powering down right away, they allowed themselves to continue on momentum, almost invisible to scanners and unlikely to be picked up by manual observation.

Pelios would not know that the attack was imminent - Not until it was far too late.

* * *

"Sit there... Lie down..." Alek's instructions came with a lifetime of easy authority behind them, and they were in his environment - in the main room of his apartments high in one of the main towers of the Habitat, in fact - and Mara did as he asked. She reclined on the couch, and looked up at the apparatus suspended above with curious interest.

"What is that...?" she asked.

"I'm going to get you to proceed to the interface in a moment..." Alek said, busy setting a program in motion at his work desk. Caul looked back and forth between them - How much of this he was following was anyone's guess, and neither thought at any point to ask him.

Alek had smuggled them here in his private lift, their journey unrecorded and seemingly unremarked upon. The privileges of a senior A - the _most_ senior A - citizen were apparently sacrosanct. He had allowed them both time to clean up after their ordeal in the jungle, and done so himself, but it was clear he had a very particular reason for bringing them back here.

He took a cranial lead over to Caul and handed it to him. "Do you mind if he monitors...?" he asked over his shoulder to Mara.

"Monitors what...?"

Alek turned to her, leaving Caul with the lead in his hand. "Your past, my girl, is... How can I put this...? _Mysterious_. Up to now, I have been the leading expert on it, at least here on Pelios. Now, _you_ are about to find out everything _I_ know..."

Mara just stared at him for a long moment, and her eyes flickered over to the waiting Caul. "Plug in, Caul."

Alek made the final preparations. "Relax... Let your mind go blank... Focus."

"Where's _my_ lead...?"

"You don't need one. Just look at the Opticon above you." At the back of her mind, Mara idly wondered what other technology was reserved only for the most senior A citizens, but she mainly focused on readying herself for interfacing with whatever program she was about to go inside.

The secrets of the past... revealed. She should have been excited. Why did she feel like they might be better buried?

She closed her eyes, and opened her virtual ones. The interface - the same white corridor she had seen many times before, the same junction. As ever, she waited till one became more distinct than the others and walked down it... Into...

Void.

She fought the wave of nausea that threatened to tear her out of the program, and allowed herself to be reassured by Alek's disembodied voice - This time it really was his, not that of his data ghost. _"I'm going to show you something..."_ he said. _"In five seconds, you will see an image. I want you to share your response without delay, whatever it might be..."_

She waited. _"One..."_ he said - _"Two, three, four, five..."_ Then she saw _him_ \- for the first time, but as it would turn out, not the last.

The man was young, or certainly not very old - the time stamp on the visual log his image was taken from told her this was thirty years ago - He was neither tall nor short, of slightly stocky build, dark hair falling in a fringe over his forehead, his cold eyes looking along the sights of the strange-looking gun he held. Pitiless. Merciless. Ruthless. Or was that just what he wanted to project...?

 _"Quick, girl..."_ Alek urged. _"Your reaction. Do you know him...?"_

"No" she replied. "I have never seen this man before. To my knowledge, at least."

The image vanished, leaving her in the black void once more. "In another five seconds..." Alek said calmly "There will be another image. I want your reaction to this one too... _One_ "-

-He had lied. The image appeared - the man appeared - right away. He was a little taller and sturdier in build. He had a full head of thick curly hair, and held the same peculiar kind of gun the other man had. So many things passed through her mind as she saw him, so many unexpected emotions, but at the forefront was the simple, inescapable fact that this was not the first time she had seen that face.

"Yes..." she said aloud, voice unemotional, but tears starting to form in her real eyes - Alek nodded as if it confirmed something he had suspected - "Who is he...?" she whispered. "Who is this man...?"

Alek leaned in close to her and replied quietly. "His name was Blake."

* * *

 _Star Maiden_ hung in space at the edge of the system. On the spacious bridge, dimly-lit with white-robed Lightseekers huddled over the workstations, Tylner presided high above them, receiving their reports.

"Attack ready to commence..." said one. "Awaiting final instructions..."

Tylner picked up the hand-held device the captain of the _Star Maiden_ had once used to jovially address his passengers - Now it connected him with the ships of his attack divisions. "The attack is authorised, authorised, authorised..." he said - "Commence attack. Commence. Commence. _Commence_..."

* * *

"The man's body in the crashed ship..." said Alek, as Mara allowed his disembodied voice to conjure up whole worlds in the black void, "was partially identified as this man - _Roj Blake_... The body of the woman, I'm afraid, has yet to be positively identified..."

" _Partially identified_...?" queried Mara. "What does _that_ mean...?"

"His biodata was somehow... damaged, in such a way that we were never able to make a fully accurate profile for him. We relied on visual identification from images taken at the site and recorded on the Federation's main security database..."

"What was wrong with the biodata...?"

"Irrecoverably corrupted... Or perhaps, as I argued at the time, so _different_ that our normal analysis procedures were inadequate..."

"Was Blake not human...? Nothing I've ever heard about him suggests that."

"I said it was _mysterious_ , didn't I...? The conclusion was that his body had been badly damaged by radiation before the crash. There was no _other_ indication of that, it's nonsense as far as I am concerned, but it was easier to believe than the alternatives, and so was allowed to stand."

"And what _did_ you think...?"

This man both _was and was not_ Roj Blake..." said Alek. "The visual ID, checked and re-checked, says he is. The biodata analysis suggests he is someone, or some _thing_ , else entirely. The visual match is just _too_ precise. The biodata analysis totally unreliable, so I lean a little more toward the notion that he _was_."

She hadn't wanted to rush to the question, but she finally asked it. "Were they my parents?"

"The woman _was_ your mother, _yes_. There is no doubt."

"And was Blake my father...?"

"Impossible to say."

"Who was the _other_ man...?"

"His name is Kerr Avon. He was Blake's colleague for some years in his insurrection against the Federation... Some say his lieutenant, assuming Blake actually had a formal chain of command... Some say, _friend_ too... Sources differ on that."

"I"-

-"And he was the one who murdered Blake on the planet _Gauda Prime_ just slightly under twenty-seven years ago."

Silence persisted for some time. "How is that possible...?" she asked, voice brittle.

"I don't know. Too many sources agree that Blake died on Gauda Prime to be easily dismissed, and yet here we have what appears to be his corpse, _here_ on Pelios. Crashed, just days later."

"He must have escaped from Gauda Prime. But what was he doing _here_...?"

"There, I'm afraid, is where our ignorance makes us equals."

"You have more information?"

"I do indeed..." said Alek. " _Now_ , everything you know of this man Blake and his crew is little more than folk tales, myths distorted by distance and multiple tellings... What I am about to share with you is everything the Habitat has. Sensitive information, sourced mainly from the Federation's own databases... Trial records, military dispatches, visual and aural logs, ministerial meetings... One thing, alas, we have never been able to reach is biodata records, or that could have solved our mystery right away... Too secure in their encryption, and now the Federation is gone so too are the records... _Ready...?_ "

"No."

"Do you want it all anyway...?"

"Yes."

Mara let the information come to her - Visual, aural, written, subliminal, _intuitive_... She read the reports, watched the trials, heard the testimonies, saw the faces and the bodies of those involved - Roj Blake watched as a machine decided his guilt or innocence on blatantly trumped-up charges... Space Commander Travis later found himself in a very similar situation... Before that, Travis related his many attempts to destroy Blake and his miraculous ship, the Liberator...

Something in the records triggered a memory - Finding the strange device in the jungle... Her finger poised over the controls with some strange compulsion to activate it... _"So that's IMIPAK..."_ she whispered.

Then came the war... The first war...

Then... Star One destroyed... Blake was gone... Travis was gone... There was Avon... and Servalan! The Federation's Supreme military Commander was now President, and she took personal charge of the capture of the Liberator and final destruction of Avon and his crew... Till the destruction of the Liberator above the artificial planet Terminal...

 _It wasn't over..._ From a hidden base, Avon and his crew rebuilt... Finally, as the Federation expanded again, with Servalan back from the dead, shrouded in the false identity of Commissioner Sleer, he built a new resistance movement, an alliance of many planets... He almost succeeded... _He failed_...

One final effort... Find him... Find Blake...

Gauda Prime... The trap was set with precision... A Federation operative - Arlen - infiltrated Blake's organisation... Troops moved in to capture Blake _and_ Avon and all the others - Vila Restal, Del Tarrant, Dayna Mellanby, Soolin - in one fell swoop...

The unexpected... Blake shot dead by Avon... The others fell... _Avon..._ There the record failed to illuminate any further.

It all took a little under six minutes.

 _"Now you know it all..."_ said Alek, as Mara's tear-filled eyes looked at him almost accusingly.

* * *

The attack ships of the Children of Light glowed white-hot as they entered Pelios's atmosphere - If anyone happened to be looking up from the Habitat, they would have seen the fine points of light in the sky, presaging what was to come...

No one did.

* * *

Dorra opened her eyes, and sighed. It was worse than she feared.

With some difficulty, she got up off her couch, identical to the one in Alek's apartment, and moved over to her personal work desk. She deactivated her Opticon, and her hand paused as it passed over the controls... For a long moment, she considered forgetting what she had just been monitoring.

It would be so easy.

_No._

Her fingers touched the controls, and the intercom activated.

* * *

"We have to hurry..." Alek's limp became more pronounced as he led Mara and Caul to his private lift. Both of them found themselves taken aback.

"Wait..." Mara said. This was moving a little too quickly for her, and she doubted Caul was coping any better. "You're saying you have a ship...? We're going...? Leaving Pelios...? Just like that...?"

Alek turned, mouth hanging open as he considered her words. "No, not just like that. I'm seventy-four years old. This has been at the back of my mind for... Oh, I couldn't really say how long... It's time... It's just... time..." He shrugged. "I'll go alone if I must."

Mara shook her head slowly, still having trouble. _Leave_ Pelios...? The prospect was... exciting, certainly. Terrifying. Daunting. Wonderful. Impossible to face. Impossible to turn away from. She turned to Caul and, their faces close together, searched his features for clues to what he was thinking about this. Her mouth moved without forming words.

Caul just stared back. Unprompted, both of them found themselves grasping each others' hands, each as clammy as the other. Holding them tight.

She turned back to Alek - "Where is this _ship_...?"

* * *

Dorra led the way down the corridor slowly, purposefully, like she was at the head of a funeral procession - Behind her, the guards hands held tight onto their unaccustomed guns, recently broken out of the armory with very little notice. She was in no hurry to get there, dreading what might happen when they reached their destination.

Not for a moment, however, did she consider turning away.

* * *

Alek tried to summon the lift several times, telling himself there was merely a minor fault even as all his instincts and experience told him otherwise - His hoped-for element of surprise was lost, if indeed he had ever had it.

"Dorra" he said quietly. A single word with the full weight a lifetime of mixed emotions behind it. Mara and Caul, hands still joined, stood watching his growing apprehension nervously, and he turned to them.

"They're not going to beat us that easily..."

He led them to a second door, and forced it open against some resistance, and a moment later they were hurrying down a dimly-lit, little-used service corridor. Mara tried to take Alek's arm to help him, and after automatically refusing the help at first he took it gratefully the second time.

They approached an intersection, and without warning the Habitat security guards appeared and blocked the way. They turned, only to find more guards appearing at the other end.

They were trapped.

It took several seconds before Dorra joined them, having of necessity stopped keeping up with the guards some time ago. When she came into view and saw them, her eyes passed over Mara and Caul dismissively and she stared levelly at Alek for a long moment.

He met her gaze unflinchingly. _No regrets, my love._

She turned away.

* * *

The attacking forces of the Children of Light approached through the atmosphere of Pelios like a swarm of angry insects - focused, intent, and for any who observed their approach, ominous.

The landing craft began to touch down, the first advance guard in the ships most suitable for this type of assault - They had done this before, many times, and the operation was well-oiled. Before long, streams of white-robed fanatics, each with their own distinctive dark stains, were running toward the Habitat, each possible exit cut off and guarded, each division and company with its own specific task to perform, each officer focused on his or her goal.

The Habitat's security forces resisted piecemeal, and dozens of minor skirmishes developed - The Children of Light took some casualties, casualties they were prepared for, and their assault was not even slightly disrupted. Habitat security took far more. They fell back. Again and again, they fell back.

Before long, there was nowhere else to fall back to. For the first time in its two-hundred and fifty year existence, the Habitat was about to fall.

Pelios was about to fall.

* * *

The swarm of landing ships were reflected on the outside of the vast windows of the observation rooms high on the Habitat's central towers, all of them now crammed with observers. Lines of faces - shocked, drained of colour, expressions dead-eyed.

Unprepared.

The guards who had been escorting her were unable to stop Mara shoving her way through the crowd to see outside, and she looked down. As she saw what was happening on the ground, her eyes were alone among the observers in being alive and alert, her mind racing - Looking back, just tall enough to see over most of the heads of those around her, she saw Alek's grim face, his eyes just like hers.

If any leadership was likely to be provided, if anything at all was to be salvaged from this disaster, here it was.

* * *

**Revenant, deep space - 6 months later  
**

Mara found Darvin by himself on Revenant's bridge, and she went to sit down by him. They sat in silence for a while.

"Do you want to tell me what that was...?" she asked. "Another test?"

"Yes" he replied.

"Did I pass?"

"No pass or fail with this one. No right or wrong. Just left or right. Up or down."

"Deep."

He smiled.

"You weren't taking any chances, anyway" she said. "So you want him alive."

He looked slightly offended for a moment. "I'm not a monster...!"

"No... You _were_ a Federation officer, though..."

"In my defence, not a very good one... Were we _all_ monsters, then...? Is that your considered opinion, Miss Mara...? Or Blake, or whatever your name is..."

"No, that's the general consensus..." The faintest of smiles took the edge off her words somewhat.

 _"Is it...?"_ He laughed. "Well, I've got one thing to say to General Consensus... Try _being there_."

"I _was_ , apparently. But I was very young."

He looked at her, pondering... " _All right_... I wasn't going to mention any of this... But I think I owe you, after you stepped up for us like you did..."

"You _know_ something..."

"No... _Well_ , not a lot... But where we're going, you're going to meet someone who might be able to fill in a lot of blanks for you... We'll be back at base in about thirty-five hours..."

"This person... Did they send you to find us...?"

"That she did."

"Why?"

"She was... curious, I suppose."

"Should I be worried...?" She searched his face for non-verbal clues as well as waiting for the answer.

"In my experience... usually."

* * *

Work on the teleport interface had taken longer than anticipated. Caul was exhausted, and glad to be on his way to a well-earned rest for the first time since boarding _Revenant -_ Hard to believe they had still only been aboard less than one cycle. As he traversed the officers' habitation corridor on his way to his assigned quarters, he remembered suddenly Rissa's somewhat curious request, and he stopped at her door.

To his mild surprise, he saw that she had been right - There was a problem with the locking mechanism, and the door had stuck while still slightly open... Well, he would soon fix that.

Delving into the sub-menus, trying to do so as quietly as possible so as not to disturb Rissa, he soon managed to find the problem. Simple. Someone must have mistakenly programmed it so the lock wouldn't engage. A few moments' work was all it took, and to Caul's satisfaction the door slid smoothly closed and the lock engaged with a click.

 _Another problem solved_ , he reflected happily as he went to his own quarters. Rissa would be pleased.


	8. Chapter 8

"What is this place...?" A question Mara had been about to ask, but Caul, leaning over the control desk on _Revenant_ 's bridge, got there before her - Rissa looked over at him and her gaze lingered, assessing him curiously.

"If you have to ask, you don't know..." Darvin said smoothly. Then looked quizzical. "No, wait... I got that wrong..." He turned to Rissa - "What did I mean...?" - She shrugged nonchalantly.

"If you have to ask, you wouldn't understand...?" suggested Mara, coming forward to join Caul.

"That's probably it" said Darvin, still dissatisfied. "Sorry, forget I said anything..." Engaging the ship's automated pilot, he added _"Just enjoy the view..."_

The settlement must have started long ago as a small mining outpost, Mara guessed - Safe to say it had grown from there. Well out from its star, only a point of light in the distance, the small blue planetoid was clearly their destination, but the multitude of rocks around it kept obscuring her view - Asteroids, hundreds at least, each pursuing an eccentric course around the planetoid. Alarming, but Darvin and Rissa's nonchalance suggested that they might not be the navigational hazard they seemed to be.

"The system is TNCB-5213" said Darvin. "The position is the middle of nowhere, in galactic terms... At least, till recently..."

 _Revenant_ swooped through the careering asteroids, backing and veering as required, and suddenly plunged toward the planetoid's surface. Darvin and Rissa watched eagerly for signs of discomfort from their guests, but neither Mara or Caul would give them that satisfaction.

Watching the monitors, they could just make out structures on some of the asteroids - Mining outposts. They turned their attention to the rapidly approaching surface, and became aware of a hazy mist gathering around the ship.

"Cloud?" Mara queried. "I wouldn't have thought this place had an atmosphere."

"Artificial" said Rissa.

"And if you're wondering what paid for that, you've just seen it..." said Darvin. "Those asteroids are rich in... Well, where do you start...? Helium-two, mercury, selenium, zeiton... Even gold, of all things, not that it's much use..." He shrugged. "The asteroids are held here by gravity generators at the centre of GC - A source of wealth _and_ protection in one. Spinning around endlessly and - here's the thing - _unpredictably_ , but never colliding with each other... The pilot who could get through this without computer assistance - Well, there isn't one... No one is quite that good..." - His tone implied an unspoken _Not even me -_ "To land, you need permission from down _there_."

As they descended from cloud level and approached the surface, he added "Welcome, my friends, to Galaxy City!" Next to him, Rissa punched the air weakly in listless sort of mock triumph before letting her arm fall limply to her side.

"Remarkable" breathed Mara, and Darvin turned to her. "Yeah, quite a place..." he said. "Not a bad place to get lost in, if you're of a mind to..." He looked at her pointedly. "An even better place to be found. You just have to meet the right people..."

* * *

If Mara and Caul had expected to see, as the name Galaxy City suggested, a massive complex of buildings on the surface of the planetoid - anything to rival the Habitat on Pelios - they were to be disappointed. The surface, with its generated nitrogen and oxygen atmosphere, could support life, and indeed could be circumnavigated in ninety minutes at a brisk walk, but it wasn't actually host to Galaxy City - It _was_ Galaxy City. A fact that became clear when _Revenant_ was greeted with a landing platform that rose out of the ground and, upon touching down, was conveyed beneath the surface as a concealed hatch closed behind them.

Darvin led Mara, Caul and Rissa out through the airlock and along the transfer tube, and into a service corridor overlooking the vast hangar in which _Revenant_ was now docked, only to be greeted with-

\- "You've picked a bad time to get back...!" -

\- The tall young woman with long red-gold hair stalked away after making that terse statement, her leather-sleeved lilac dress billowing behind her, and Darvin hurried with a little difficulty to catch up.

"What exactly does _that_ mean?" he demanded, moving in front of her and giving her no choice but to stop - She looked slightly dubiously at Darvin's companions but made no comment.

"Mara, Caul... Meet Juni..." Darvin said to them. "Juni - Mara and Caul..."

Juni gave a perfunctory nod and folded her arms. "I imagine I'll get to learn your names, if you turn out to be important..." Back to Darvin - "Scarn is here."

"You're joking!"

"Why would I do _that_?" She seemed genuinely confused by his assertion.

"In person...?"

"Of course not in person! He wouldn't fit through half the doors. But it looks like he's planning to say something - They're setting up a projector now..."

Darvin appeared a little flustered as he turned to them again, and Mara got the impression he was talking to them as a means of giving himself time to think. "Juni is the Administrator's personal assistant, basically she runs this place day to day..." He turned back to Juni. "Why is he doing this?"

She shrugged. "I just got back myself." Mara found her attention drawn to a small object on a fine chain around Juni's neck, one that she had started absently exploring with her fingers during her conversation with Darvin. A very striking and distinctive piece of jewellery, some kind of natural object - like a pearl from the seas of old Earth such as Mara had seen a specimen of on Pelios - a dull white in diffused light but glittering with a multitude of colours when she turned and one of the light sources in the corridor caught it. As if aware of her interest in the object, Juni concealed it again under her dress and half-turned away.

"I need to see her. Now..." said Darvin. "No, wait. I'll get changed first..." He was thinking furiously. The attack on _Revenant_ , the sudden visit... How did it fit together...?

"Suit yourself. I imagine she'll be kept busy today anyway." Juni turned on the rather tall heels of her almost knee-length plastic boots and continued on at a fast pace, and they followed into the main concourse.

It was full of technicians and other base personnel hurrying to and fro, and guests from - well - everywhere. Even with their journeys of the past six months, Mara and Caul could not have imagined such a variety of beings existing in one place, such a variety of human cultures and, if they were not very much mistaken, the occasional non-human one too. The array of sights, sounds and exotic smells was bewildering and they cast a glance at each other, thoroughly confounded.

Nothing like Gauda Prime or Danteron. Certainly nothing like Pelios.

Then finally they passed into the central hub of Galaxy City, a vast space on several levels with a multitude of shops selling produce from across the galaxy. "Look up, if it doesn't make you dizzy..." said Darvin, obviously relishing the opportunity to show the place off to his guests.

They did, and gasped - The ceiling, which couldn't be much more than a hundred feet above them, though the distance was difficult to judge, was lit to simulate a blue Earth sky, compete with wispy white clouds. A bizarre and, at first, unsettling illusion which did indeed leave them feeling dizzy.

"Ooh..." Mara turned as Rissa grabbed her arm excitedly, and drew her and Caul's attention - "Watch _this_... Watch, and let me know what you think..." Bemused, Mara turned back to see what Rissa was getting so excited about.

Juni hold out a hand hesitantly to pluck the flowing sleeve of a tall - very tall - figure examining some alien fruit. Hesitant...? That wasn't what she had come to expect of Juni, even in such a brief acquaintance... The figure turned, and Mara and Caul exchanged glances - The tall man had been hidden from them by his large ornate collar, but now they could see him they found that his appearance was extraordinary.

He was long-faced and solemn and his complexion was unnaturally pale. His eyes were surrounded by a painted dark area, whether make-up or permanent tattoo was unclear. He looked otherwise basically human, but they found themselves wondering if they were about to encounter their first humanoid alien - In the explored section of the galaxy such things were rare, thanks to the Federation, but not unheard of.

"Faal..." said Juni, and the tall man bowed slightly, his eyes never leaving her face. "I'm... back..." she continued haltingly.

He nodded, as if to agree that this was self-evidently true, and his passive glance swept over the others disinterestedly. At a loss for anything else to say, she made do with "I'll see you at the next meeting..." and Faal bowed again.

"No, you didn't imagine that..." said Darvin quietly as they continued on their way. "And no, they're not. Not as far as I know, anyway."

"Not what?" Mara asked Caul, but he was equally nonplussed.

* * *

When Mara and Caul had gazed up at the artificial sky, the last thing they would have expected was for someone to be looking back - but someone was.

The watcher stood on a viewing platform and looked down and through the sky, opaque on the underside but transparent from above. An artificial sky may have been somewhat superfluous now that there was a real one above ground, but this feature pre-dated that development and, then as now, had concealed the office and living quarters of the City's Chief Administrator.

Manipulation of the control panel built onto the platform yielded a floating holographic monitor, which proceeded to magnify a portion of the view, allowing Madame Orella to get a good look at the new arrivals.

* * *

"Old, fat and rich... Basically, everything I aspire to be." That was Darvin's summation of President Scarn, who was technically the owner of the ships that had attacked them on their way home. Rissa's lip had curled at the first mention of him.

They had casually joined the crowd assembled in the main square. Like the others, they were surprised when the heavy-set old man, like all Proximan aristocrats a ludicrous figure with his flowing robes and his heavily-waxed hair sculpted into tall stiff spikes, suddenly sprang into being, several times larger than life - and that was large - on a specially prepared dais.

It appeared President Scarn was going to address the informal assembly.

Mara noted that despite the apparent casualness of the whole thing, Scarn's people moved in a carefully orchestrated way, black-clad guards - with their Federation-inspired uniforms - and white-clad officials clustered around the platform so as to block any attempts to reach their leader's image projector. Looking up, she saw the guards stationed at regular intervals along the safety rails on the upper levels, looking down on the assembly. Galaxy City's own security stood by uneasily, perhaps uncertain exactly what was required of them.

"I suspect Scarn's ambassador may not have been honest about how many men he brought with him..." Darvin said to Mara in a low voice. "There's no way Madame Orella would have let them land otherwise..." He smiled. "Well, I hope they underestimate her. I really do."

"Who's that...?"

Mara did not point, a fact Darvin noted approvingly, and he followed her gaze to a decidedly low-key figure standing below the platform - placing himself in such a way as to be visible to all and therefore see all, but draw as little attention as possible. An older man, but probably somewhat younger than Scarn himself, sparse hair slicked back, contained and watchful.

"That's Brintun..." Darvin breathed. "Job title - Not sure, actually, but it doesn't really matter... Power behind the throne, some say, but they also say that you shouldn't ever let Scarn hear you say that..."

She smiled faintly. "I won't. Promise."

"Good girl. Knew you could be counted on."

"If Scarn dislikes this Brintun, and he's as powerful as you say, why doesn't he just dismiss him...?"

"I don't think you're ever going to be much of a politician, my friend..." said Darvin, his tone making the observation clearly into a compliment. "You know, Scarn can't be projecting that all the way from Proxima... He must be somewhere pretty close by..."

 _"My people...!"_ \- began Scarn, in a voice that was expertly projected even without the loudspeakers dedicated to the task.

\- " _His_ people...?" bristled Rissa -

- _"You must all be wondering why I am here..."_ Scarn continued. _"I know there is a certain... history of... fractiousness between us, but then we have all lived through troubled times... Well, it is my hope that that will soon be at an end. It is no secret that Madame Orella and myself have been engaging in dialogue recently... Productive dialogue, to be sure. And I hope that the fruits of that dialogue will soon be clear to all..."_

 _"Get on with it...!"_ said a male voice in the crowd, and Mara noted that some of the guards around Scarn's projector scanned the assembly and shifted their grip on their guns. Whether he was aware of the interruption or not, the Proximan ruler continued regardless.

 _"For all that we may have had our... disagreements, one thing unites us... and that is our common stand against the great crisis of our time. The uncontrollable tide of émigrés..."_ He paused as if to collect his thoughts. _"Now, of course, it is not that we are without compassion, but there has to be a limit of some sort to"_ -

- _"What the hell is an émigré..."_ said the voice. _"Do you mean refugees...? Say refugees, then...!"_

"This was a bad idea" said Darvin with detached interest. "Wonder how Brintun's going to deal with this..."

"I think I can guess..." said Rissa grimly, and with that pushed her way through the people in front of them and quickly vanished into the crowd.

Scarn's voice drifted over again. _"As I say, and everywhere I go I hear this again and again..."_ he said. _"The flood of non-indigenous peoples into the core worlds is in very real danger of swamping us... Of overwhelming our infrastructure and threatening to stretch our resources beyond breaking point..."_

 _"Non-indigenous...? Get a better speech writer... We're all from fucking Earth...!"_ The emphatic interruption seemed to be some sort of breaking point for Scarn's retinue, or else perhaps it had taken them till now to locate the man in the crowd, but now several guards plunged determinedly into the assembly toward him, people hurriedly moving back to allow them access.

 _"But more than that..."_ Scarn continued, oblivious - _"More important than our infrastructure, it is our very culture... our way of life, that is under threat..."_

"From you..." mused Darvin.

 _"Fuck you...!"_ The man was sturdily-built, bent-nosed and thick-necked, and stood his ground unafraid - He wore hard-wearing tunic, trousers and boots that marked him out clearly as one of the city's contractor construction workers. He looked at the guards closing in on him with what seemed like polite interest.

 _"But all is not lost... No..."_ said Scarn - _"Fortunately for all, this great crisis is going to become the greatest of opportunities... Unified Systems stands at a crossroads..."_

"Last time I checked, Galaxy City wasn't affiliated with UniS..." Darvin said in a worried tone, and turned to Mara. "Now the attack starts to make sense."

_"...and that this happens to coincide with an opportunity for expansion into the furthest corners of the galaxy, is a very fortunate coincidence... New worlds to tame, great projects that will require vast manpower... WE stand ready to forge an empire like the galaxy has never seen..."_

"Just nobody say _Federation_ , eh..." commented Darvin. "Nobody say the actual word, and it's all fine."

"Or _slavery_..." Mara replied quietly.

Scarn's guards were starting to lead the man away, with him refusing to let them grip his arms, when Rissa stepped in front of them. And shifted to stand in front of them again when they tried to avoid her.

"Hello. Going somewhere? Can I come?"

"Go away, little girl..." said one of the guards - "Before you have to get _another_ new set of eyes..." He waved his hand in front of her in an exaggerated fashion, and tried to move around her again.

"You know..." Rissa said - "This is normally my favorite part, but I hate you people so much I'm going to skip it, all right..." Before the guard even knew she had moved, she had elbowed him in the face and a second later her knee slammed into his genitalia, probably doing permanent damage. The other guards didn't get a chance to use their greater weight - or weight of numbers - against her, as Rissa just slipped through them and casually tipped one of them over on top of the others, leaving them in a struggling heap.

"Should we help...?" asked Mara.

"No..." replied Darvin. "I think there's almost enough of them."

* * *

Sol Brintun was sweating in what was for him the uncomfortable warmth of the City Administrator's luxurious suite of rooms. His round-collared civilian suit, like all the ones he owned, was dark to hide the more or less permanent sweat stains. He walked across the reception room, annoyed at how his feet sunk into the plush carpet, and his tiny eyes skimmed over the Administrator's art collection indifferently.

"Thank you, I won't have a drink" he said in his reedy voice.

"I didn't offer one..." said Madame Orella lightly, and smiled broadly to show no offence was meant. Orella was a woman of, if hearsay was to be believed, more than sixty years, somewhere around Brintun's own age, although her relatively unlined face and bob-cut black hair seemed to belie that. "Your reputation precedes you here, and that includes your well-known... vicelessness."

She moved across the room with an easy elegance, feet hidden by her long dark-red fur-lined dress, one arm swinging lightly at her side while the other held a glass of green liquid. "I'm not sure I entirely believe it, to be quite frank."

Brintun cleared his throat, and proceeded to talk as soon as Orella had stopped. "The President"-

-"Can I offer you _any_ refreshment at all?" asked Orella as she sat in an ornate chair built on Earth centuries before. "I believe we have some that are _not_ psychoactive, though personally I have very little use for those..." She smiled again, and again noted that Brintun wasn't in any way responsive - just impatient for her to stop talking so that he could begin again.

Not a diplomat. Not a man of any particular principles or goals beyond the acquisition of power. Apparently no appetite for sensual pleasures of any sort, although her sources were still digging at that particular seam. What did he want, beyond the continued rise of his tiresome bloated master...? Orella sat back in her chair, determined to find out, and waved him to the chair opposite, making a mental note to have it taken out and cleaned later.

Reluctantly, Brintun sat, his face wearing the same pained scowl as it had when the guards ushered him in. "The President wants me to convey his congratulations on your recent successes..." He rushed through that, as though impatient with such diplomatic niceties while grudgingly accepting their necessity.

"Successes...?"

"Your recent agreement with Lod of Herriol for one thing. A real step forward, if free trade throughout the sector is your goal." He seemed pleased for the first time, as it became clear he had put Madame Orella off her stride. "That is your goal, I take it?" At the sight of the watery smirk that crossed his face, Orella wished for the return of the pained scowl.

"You are very well informed, Mister Brintun."

"Of course. I have to be. I haven't got to this position by dint of my charm."

"I don't know _what_ you mean" she said disingenuously, chin resting on one hand.

"I mean what I said." While he took off his glasses and used a cloth to wipe his eyes clear of excess moisture, Orella took the opportunity to roll hers. "Now..." he continued. "It is President Scarn's main concern, in coming here, to make sure we have very clearly defined goals... Ones that don't, shall we say, conflict with each other... It would be unfortunate if they did."

"Couldn't put it better myself."

"It is our intention to provide the leadership that has been lacking since the war... The Federation will never return, of course - There are too many for whom even the word itself is toxic... It is for President Scarn and the Unified Systems to fill that vacuum..."

"And you..."

"What about me?" - Orella waved her hand as if to say _Never mind_ , and Brintun continued - "It is inevitable. A vacuum, after all, exists only to be filled."

"That must make space travel a _very_ interesting challenge for you."

"I mean, of course, a power vacuum."

"I knew that."

"Yes." That was his perfunctory means of filling silence.

"Well, that doesn't concern me, so long as this facility can continue, free from interference."

"Of course..." He sat back, and wiped sweat from his brow. "Do you miss the Federation?"

Something in Orella's eyes changed at that moment, the easy humour of a moment ago replaced by something cold, almost reptilian - "What?"

"I do, sometimes. The certainty. The structure it gave all our lives... You know I was in the Space Service...?"

"Indeed..." A lieutenant with an undistinguished service record, as Orella knew very well.

"I do miss it sometimes... These are terrible times, and that certainty is what I want to give back to people. All people. Don't worry about the President's talk of the refugees and such. That's all just a means to an end... There will be a place for everyone..."

"A means to an end...?"

"Oh, absolutely. _Anger_ , if you can harness that and focus it... It can accomplish a lot of things that would not otherwise be possible. And uniting the majority against a substantial minority is highly effective in that regard."

"So long as that anger never focuses itself in the wrong direction."

"That's the trick."

"You don't worry that it provides somewhat shaky foundations for the next great power in the galaxy...?"

"You see..." he continued, ignoring her, "Some of us remember those days well..." He stood, and so did she, and he leaned in close - If her being slightly taller troubled him, it did not show - "I have a very good memory... _Madame Orella_..." The smirk returned. "And, to save your spies any further trouble, I'll share this fact with you quite voluntarily... I like my women _young_..."

With that, he turned and moved away - Staring at his retreating back, Orella's loathing was now quite evident. Before reaching the door, he turned and added emphatically "Young... _Madame Orella_..." and then sketched a half-formed salute and left.

Orella stood still for a very long time, face motionless, body trembling very slightly. Finally, the empty glass broke in her hand and, startled, she dropped it. She held up the hand and watched the blood seeping out from the cut and dripping onto the carpet.

* * *

"Not to worry" said Darvin unconvincingly as they turned away and wandered slowly across the square. "I'm sure he means well."

"I'm sure he doesn't care whether any of us live or die..." said Rissa, entirely unscathed by her involvement in the recent fight. "But the feeling isn't mutual - I'd like to garrote the bastard till I discover a new shade of purple and his tiny eyes slop out onto my hand." Mara and Caul looked a little askance at her, but Darvin just reached over and rubbed her shoulder briefly.

Offering no comment, Faal nodded politely to all of them and turned and walked away - Juni stood watching him for a moment, looking bereft. She failed to notice Caul standing just behind her. "You all right...?" he asked quietly.

She turned, nonplussed, as if one of the lounge tables a few feet away from where they stood had asked her a question. There was a long pause before she said "Which one are you again...? I've forgotten."

Caul already wished he hadn't spoken, even before the reply, and he just stood back out of her way as she strode purposefully off, heels clicking. He was startled as Mara, whom he hadn't realized was so close, suddenly clutched his arm with a painfully tight grip.

Her face had drained of colour, and in answer to his questioning look she could only nod across the square - He turned to follow her gaze, and immediately felt like he had been punched in the gut.

President Scarn's embassy was filing through one of the archways toward the lifts, and among the gaudily dressed aristocrats, austere attendants and grim military men, there was a small group who were instantly and terrifyingly familiar. Their robes were gleaming white - not caked in mud like the last ones he had seen - making the dark-red stains stand out even more starkly than they otherwise would.

The Children of Light had come to Galaxy City.

* * *

"Darling girl...!" Madame Orella greeted Juni as she came into her suite, and held her hands. "How was the journey?"

"Good..." Juni replied, looking round the reception room as Orella poured two glasses of the green liquid. "Something's different."

"Yes..." Orella said mischievously. "Take your time, see if you can work it out... While I hear your report."

"Herriol went well" said Juni, accepting the glass. "They're just as opposed to trade barriers as we are, so once we get down to negotiations with a full team..." She was staring at Orella's bandaged hand. "What happened...?"

"It's nothing. Don't concern yourself. Now... Betafarl...?"

"Exactly as you'd expect."

"Oh dear..." Orella moved around the room slowly. "Well, when the rest of us are reaping the rewards perhaps they'll think differently."

"I think it very likely." Juni finished her drink and went to put it down. Realising something, she smiled. "It's the collection..."

"Be more specific..."

Juni walked along the objets d'art and contemplated the items one by one. Finally she settled. "This is new, isn't it...?" Orella glided across the room to join her as Juni peered closely at the peculiar, apparently abstract, piece.

"...No, it's quite old..."

A transparent box, made of some kind of hard-wearing plastic, Juni guessed, with what looked like a cobbled together mass of electronic components inside. There were several light sources in there too, but at this moment the box was dark. "Does it light up inside?" she wondered.

"It did once. But it hasn't for some time."

"Why not get it fixed?"

"Why indeed...?" Orella pondered. Moving on, she gently steered Juni by the shoulders away from the box and toward the door. "Now, I understand Captain Darvin has returned."

"Yes, of course, I'll send him in."

With an affectionate squeeze of her shoulder, Orella let Juni go, and then turned away from the door. She stared for a long moment at the box, and that was how Darvin found her as he was shown in. The doors were closed again to give them privacy.

"Captain!" Orella greeted him, as he stepped forward and touched his brow to her proffered hand. "A productive journey...?"

Darvin sighed ruefully. "Do _I_ have a report for _you_...?!"

"Well, I certainly hope so." That was said good-naturedly, but with a hint of steel. "Come through. Drink?"

"Of course..." he said, following Orella through a doorway and down a few steps to a sitting area where a large horseshoe-shaped couch waited invitingly. Collapsing onto it, Darvin flexed his sore foot inside its rigid boot. He looked forward to getting back into his everyday wear, but accepted the benefits of a dress code - Orella was old-school, and deserved the pomp as much as she expected it.

Orella came to join him with another two glasses of the green liquid, and let Darvin have a sip of his before she began. "The signal...?"

"We have lots more data. I've turned it over... Maybe more can be gleaned from what we have..."

"But you don't think so." She thought for a moment. "Well, I see why you weren't in any rush to report."

He took another sip and swilled it round his mouth, letting it sting. "Just an unfortunate consequence of coming back today. I didn't want to distract you from the President's ambassador."

"You always were discreet. But I think you'll find I'm quite capable of concentrating on two things at once."

He dipped his glass in acknowledgment of the mild rebuke. "Noted." He threw his eyes to the side in a mute question, and Orella looked over in that direction toward the control panel on the wall.

"The scrambler is activated, yes."

He took a breath. "I've brought them with me."

"Excellent."

"I don't think you'll find out much from them, though... They're just a couple of kids... Well, _kids_ \- They're not _that_ young, I suppose, but they've come from some strange backwater, so they might as well be kids."

"Leave that to me - You've done very well getting them here. Thank you."

Eyebrows raised, Darvin took another drink, and broached the next thing he wanted to say. "Actually, I like them. If that's worth anything. We were attacked on the way back, and let's just say they pulled their weight and then some. I was hoping... Once you've talked to them, I was going to offer them berths on Revenant... With your permission, of course."

Orella smiled secretively. "Perhaps you shall." Her eyes became cold again as she looked at him. "Attacked?"

"Yes." He leaned forward. "Three of the new Gamma Pursuit Ships. UniS ships. I suppose they counted on me not getting back here to implicate them."

"Have they seen you since you arrived?"

He shrugged. "Possibly. They'll know _Revenant_ is here soon enough... Sorry, if I had known they were coming..."

Orella held up a hand to stop him, and smiled grimly. "Yesterday, I might have been surprised. But after what I've heard today, it makes perfect sense..."

"UniS have arrived out here ahead of even the most pessimistic estimates. Looks like our hand is forced."

"Meaning...?"

Darvin looked awkward - "Well... I know it's been a while, but _Scarn_ won't have forgotten you... Perhaps some of his people..."

"I think we may already have passed that threshold..." She stood, and deposited her glass on the nearby table. "Was that everything...?"

Darvin hurried to catch up with the suddenness with which his audience had been terminated, draining his glass and struggling to his feet. "One attacking ship was destroyed. The others dispersed. We captured the commander of the destroyed ship."

"I didn't expect them to move against us so soon..." Orella mused.

"Tell me about it."

"Keep the prisoner safe... I'll send for you soon, Captain... Send in the girl you brought back."

He nodded. "She's waiting now."

* * *

Amid all of Madame Orella's collection, Mara's attention had quickly been drawn to the same object that had so intrigued Juni. She brushed her fingers over the hard, lightly-stained surface of the box, aware of the door guard's discreet scrutiny. Hearing someone move up behind her, she turned to see Darvin walk past - He gave her a reassuring grin as he left.

Orella came through the inner door to join Mara in the reception room, and they looked at each other for a long moment. Mara didn't really know what she had expected, but Madame Orella's appearance almost instantly made her feel like there was a lead weight in the pit of her stomach.

_"Are you all right, my dear...?"_

Orella's question sounded like it came from thirty feet away instead of eight or nine, and Mara heard the heart thumping in her chest. As Orella stepped forward, Mara automatically stepped back, and seeing the older woman's face change she realised that she understood.

_She knew._

Orella. That was not her name. Mara never forgot a face, and as she stood there faced by Galaxy City's Administrator, her mind went back to Alek's apartment in the Habitat, and the records of Roj Blake. She saw the faces, one by one... Blake... Kerr Avon... Jenna Stannis... Vila Restal...

This face had been there in those records. Despite her strenuous efforts to remove all such references, the erstwhile Commissioner Sleer had never thought to venture as far as Pelios to purge their archives. There, a picture of her had been retained.

This woman had once been Supreme Commander of the Federation's military forces, and later President. She had hunted Blake and then Avon remorselessly across the galaxy. She was a ruthless opportunist. A cold-blooded killer. Dangerous in a way that few people could ever aspire to be dangerous.

She was Servalan.


	9. Chapter 9

**DSV-A1, Deep space, 1,458,000 spacials from designated embarkation point...**

The ship, under precise and highly efficient control, slowed as it neared the star system TNCB-5213. Navigation, battle and damage control computers briefly exchanged data and settled back into automatic routine, as the central computer acknowledged their input with a simple _Confirmed_.

At the same moment as the presence of the potentially hostile spacecraft flotilla concealed close to the destination planetoid was registered, the ship shut down all non-essential systems and merged into the darkness of space, coasting along on its momentum. A stealth approach - None would know of its presence until the very last moment.

* * *

**Galaxy City**

Mara had, of course, not been allowed to enter the Administrator's quarters armed, but in this they had slightly underestimated her - The glass object, some kind of abstract sculpture, was in her hand in under a second - In three, it was broken and in five a long pointed shard was pointed threateningly toward Orella.

No... Not Orella... Or Sleer...

Servalan.

She seemed not unduly concerned. Smiling, she moved over to a chair and sat down. "Oh, silly girl... I hoped for more than this... Much more..." She sipped her drink. " _Oh well_..."

"Servalan..." said Mara. It was the first time she had spoken the name, and it felt strange. Strange also to find herself finally confronted by her... Unreal.

Servalan swirled the green liquid around her glass. "That's a secret known to very few, just to give you an idea what an honour this is..." She smiled, and added " _For you_."

Mara felt awkward standing there, makeshift weapon extended out in front of her, and even a little embarrassed. She let it fall onto the rug, her eyes never leaving her host.

"That was somewhat expensive and very difficult to acquire..." remarked Servalan. "Perhaps I'll deduct it from your wages, should you decide to take up Captain Darvin's offer... Oh, has he not mentioned that yet...? Forgive me..."

" _Forgive_ you..." Mara said quietly, in a daze.

"I do pay very well, if I say so myself, so it shouldn't take _too_ long to redress the balance..." Servalan gave Mara a dazzling smile, and indicated toward the other chair. "Do please sit down. Drink...?"

"I could have killed you..." Mara said, voice free of expression.

_"No you couldn't..."_

Mara looked up, startled, to see Rissa leaning over the balustrade of some kind of minstrel gallery above the door, a long-barrelled gun pointed at her. " _Oh_ , it's set to stun..." she said reassuringly - "I wouldn't harm _you_... You're like the... _I don't know_... cousin three or four times removed I never knew I had."

Behind Rissa, Darvin came into view, managing somehow to look both stern and apologetic. Mara's eyes met his in faint accusation. _Why...?_

"You must have so many questions..." said Servalan, and Mara turned back to her, startled - "I'll confess I have a few myself..."

When Mara glanced back up at the gallery, Rissa and Darvin had gone. Was she now trusted to behave...? Turning back, she found herself looking at Servalan's vulnerable throat as she spoke... It would be so easy, and there was no way they could get to her on time...

"Did you kill them...?" she asked.

That stopped Servalan, possibly even took her aback. It was very difficult to tell - This was a woman used to hiding her true feelings.

"Kill who...?"

" _Significant_ that I have to narrow it down..." mused Mara. "I mean my mother... and a man called Blake."

"I didn't kill Blake" said Servalan. "Though I confess it wasn't for want of trying..." She shrugged and took another sip. "Those were different times... As for your mother..."

"Yes...?"

"I had no idea you even existed, you know... Till a week or so ago... That's a _solar_ week... How strange we still adhere to that, don't you think...?"

"What was her name...?"

There was a long pause before Servalan answered. "Rashel."

 _"Rashel..."_ Mara said the name slowly. "Where did she come from...?" _  
_

"That I don't know, but at some point she came to work at a Federation weapons development facility."

"She developed weapons?" Mara got the sense that Servalan wanted to laugh at that point, and was holding herself in check, and the anger started to return. "Whatever it is, tell me."

"She helped the workers."

"How did she _help_ them?"

"Most of her grade were utilised as manual labour... but it was judged that she would be of far more use elsewhere." Servalan looked away. "I'm sorry. I know it's probably not what you wanted to hear."

"I wanted to hear the truth."

"Everyone thinks that."

"I'm not everyone."

Servalan seemed to consider carefully what to say next, clearly wanting to change tack somewhat. "She was"-

-"A slave. She was a slave."

"I suppose you're not the first to use that term... Whether your mother would have welcomed having it applied to her is another matter... She was... somewhat headstrong, as I recall..."

"Gave you a lot of trouble, did she...?" Mara got up and helped herself to the drink offered earlier. "Good."

Servalan sat in silence, masked by her apparently effortless calm, but Mara knew she really was taken aback now.

"I had the IMIPAK key in my hands, you know... I almost pressed it... I wonder what the range is."

"You're very quick... Quicker than she ever was, and she was far from stupid."

"I've seen the specs for IMIPAK... A time-delayed assassination weapon consisting of two devices - The gun, a marker. The key, a long-range activation device... She held that power over you for..."

"Over three years."

"I almost pressed it." Having already sipped her drink experimentally, Mara now downed the rest in one go.

"What happened after IMIPAK was stolen is not just classified, it's entirely undocumented... How did you know _I_ had been marked...?"

"I didn't" said Mara. "Not until you confirmed it just there."

"I suspect it may have been out of range, but had it worked, it wouldn't only have been _me_ you killed."

"Am I _like_ her...?"

"You remind me much more of someone else entirely."

"Blake...?"

"Not quite."

* * *

**Pelios - 6 months earlier  
**

They had lost. The fight was over before it had begun. It was not long at all before that simple fact entered Alek's head, and when it got there it was immediately and calmly - strangely so, given the situation - accepted.

Pelios was lost.

He fought his way through the crowd, and clutched Mara by the arm so as not to be swept away again by the hurrying throng - He had no idea where they were all going, but had no doubt at all that wherever it was, it would be the wrong place. The wisdom of crowds.

Pelios was lost.

He gave himself a moment to take stock. A moment, that was all. The ship wouldn't take anything like a significant portion of the Habitat's population - Half a dozen would be pushing it. In fact, four was more realistic. Four.

Four.

Himself, Mara, Caul. And... Yes, it had to be. She had to be made to realise it as clearly as he did. She had to come with them.

Pelios was lost.

"Wha- Where are you going...?" he shouted, as Mara pulled free from his grasp and made for the corridor beyond the observation room... It soon became clear what her intentions were, as she cannoned into one of the guards still holding Caul, using the crowded confusion to her advantage. The man lost his balance and was only held up by the press of the panicking throng, and Mara grabbed Caul and hauled him away.

She failed to notice, as she did so, the other guard pointing his gun at her... Pointing and... firing!

Caul noticed and, without even thinking about it, he slammed his elbow into the guard's face - causing, he suspected, more pain for himself than the guard, but surprising the man and throwing his aim off, and the shot struck harmlessly a couple of feet above and behind Mara's head. The two of them regrouped with Alek and, with great difficulty, escaped the busy junction into one of the service-corridors they had used earlier.

"What now?" demanded Mara.

"Same plan" replied Alek without emotion. "We get to the ship."

"But..." Mara let her objection end at that, because she was as aware of the situation as he was. She had seen the hordes of fanatics storming the gates.

Pelios was lost.

"Just give me one moment..." Alek said, stepping away from them and producing a small handheld device from one of his deep pockets. It only took a moment to activate, and he lifted it to his mouth.

"It's me..." he said.

* * *

Dorra had found refuge from the chaos that had suddenly enveloped her ordered world - She had only been granted a moment, however, to take stock before Alek's call interrupted her.

"I told you" she said, matter-of-fact.

 _"As I was about to say"_ Alek continued - _"You have permission to say I told you so."_

"I never asked for your permission" she retorted. "Never."

 _"Even now..."_ There was a brief pause as Alek collected his thoughts. _"I'm still leaving. Come with me."_ It was as straightforward as that, but then they really didn't have any time to waste.

"You will surrender yourself to the guards" she said calmly. "And be placed in confinement until this crisis is over."

 _"Oh, for f"_ -

-"Fail to do so and you will be shot on sight." She paused. "Please, Alek. We need you."

 _"I loved you"_ Alek replied. _"You'll know that, of course."_

"Yes."

_"Nothing to say...?"_

"Nothing." She ended the call.

* * *

Alek turned to the waiting Mara and Caul and said simply "Let's go."

Pelios was lost.

* * *

Dorra fought her way through the panic, all the while trying to rally the citizens or at least impose some kind of order on the retreat. She racked her brains for some plan - Where could they rally and defend themselves, even hope to turn the tide against the invaders...?

The truth was, the last opportunity to attempt a realistic defence had already been missed. It was too late.

Caught off balance, she stumbled. Thrown off further as her fellow citizens collided with her, she fell hard. Blinding pain, till a surge of adrenaline allowed her to drag herself to her feet...

 _No..._ If nothing else, she would meet this end standing up...

The stray shot, fired accidentally by one of her own people, killed her instantly, and for the final time Dorra fell. Careless feet trampled over her prone body - those of her own people at first, but soon those of the Children of Light.

Pelios was lost.

* * *

Perhaps it was that there had been no obvious signs that the human colony on Pelios was still a space-faring culture, or perhaps for any one of a number of reasons it was seen as a low priority, but the Children of Light's initial attacks had failed to block off access to the makeshift spaceport.

It was only with Mara and Caul's aid that Alek forced himself along the apparently endless service corridor, and then across the hangar bay used to launch the Habitat's one functioning space vessel, sounds of fighting audible in the distance. Up the steep staircase leading to the access-way, and the ship's principal airlock. Through the narrow passageway inside onto the flight deck and, with momentary relief, he collapsed into the pilot's chair.

Only momentary, because they were far from safe yet.

Under his urgent instruction, Mara and Caul helped with all the essential pre-flight routines, and Alek found himself very glad he had insisted on keeping the ship in readiness to launch. Before long, they were able to lift off, and to Alek's gratification the automatic systems successfully operated the hangar bay doors and let them out - just before that, he had been certain he could hear the firing of weapons outside. The ship was sturdy enough, but when he was able he would be sure to launch a probe to examine the hull for damage.

The ship's systems kicked in to dampen the gravitational forces which otherwise might have crushed them as the ship climbed steeply into Pelios's atmosphere and at least a chance of freedom.

Pelios was lost.

* * *

It was all Miko could do to hold back and await the incoming reports. He wanted to be at the head of his battalion once more, gun or blade in hand, the exultation of glorious, justified war washing over him. But he waited.

That was his job now, appointed by Tylner himself. To command. Tylner had told him he was meant for this - his days leading his men and women, those days when he had known such wonderful certainty in everything he did, were merely preparation for this.

When at last the news came in, he felt nothing. An objective was achieved, nothing more. And when they dropped the frail corpse on the ground before him, he felt only revulsion.

_"This seems to be the closest they had to a leader..."_

"And you bring it to me...?" Miko asked, voice dangerous. "What use have I for this... this _bag of bones_...? Take it away!"

_"Yes, sir."_

Miko stepped forward, and surveyed the growing ranks of terrified prisoners being herded together. Pelios was theirs.

Pelios was lost.

* * *

**Galaxy City - 6 months later**

"I can't believe we're doing this..." said Rissa, pacing back and forth across a few feet of floor. She and Darvin waited on a narrow walkway outside the Administrator's suite, the entire hub of Galaxy City visible around and below them through the semi-opaque artificial sky.

"They may get on" Darvin said noncommittally. If his reply was supposed to shut down the conversation, it failed.

"You'll never go against her, will you...? Not even a little... _Oh_ , but I forgot, she built you out of a kit, didn't she...?" Rissa regretted the words as soon as they were out of her mouth.

Darvin stared at her. _"Thanks..."_ he said, real anger in his eyes.

Her shiny silver eyes stared back at him, but her tone tried to diffuse the tension - "Hey... You know what I mean. _You_ built _me_ out of another kit... I get it. _Loyalty_ , I get. But what if your loyalty to two different people pulls you in two different directions...?"

"Well..." Darvin said "If you figure out the answer to that, do please let me know right away."

* * *

"Who gave you access to classified Federation files...?" asked Servalan.

"We had copies, back on Pelios, where I used to live..." Mara replied. "Don't bother going there, though... Your new allies have taken over. They hold the files now, if they survive."

That made Servalan frown momentarily, but she chose not to pursue it. "That's how you recognised me."

"You were afraid I'd gotten the information from someone else...? Like... I don't know... Avon...?"

Servalan smiled secretively, and took a few moments to answer. "The thought had crossed my mind... But why would Avon, who has managed to very effectively hide himself from me and apparently everyone else for the last fifteen years, suddenly reveal himself to the possible daughter of a _clone_ of the man he murdered...?"

This time it was Mara's turn to be taken aback - Servalan had clearly been saving this knowledge for the moment she could use it most effectively. Her mind was in turmoil, and she didn't trust herself to respond.

Servalan visibly relaxed in her chair. "Oh... Yes, I forgot to mention that, didn't I...? The real Blake most certainly died on Gauda Prime - I saw the body. _Your_ Blake was a clone. I met him - A most impressive clone, very convincing..."

"A clone... My father...?"

"I can't confirm that for you, I'm afraid. But since, during the time in question, your mother and Blake's clone were the only humans on that planet, it does seem very likely."

Mara was already coming to terms with this revelation, perhaps because she needed to so badly, perhaps because she felt she dare not grant the woman opposite any unnecessary advantage. "It doesn't matter..." she said, though who she was trying to convince was not immediately clear.

"Of course not." Servalan raise her glass slightly as if to toast the sentiment.

"I'm still his daughter..."

"And perhaps his legacy... His successor."

"What does that mean...?"

"I find myself opposed to a regime which is intent on reconquering the territories of the old Federation... It is amassing armies and ships to a degree not seen since the last war, and if it is allowed to succeed a dark age will descend on the galaxy like nothing that has ever been seen before... The Federation was founded on sound ideological principles, however it might have... drifted from them - Scarn's is a tyranny based on the wielding of power for the sake of it, for the glorification of ancient and corrupt privilege..."

Mara helped herself to a second drink - Her face was flushed now, and a smile threatened to break out and take over her till-now solemn expression. Trying to ignore that, Servalan continued - "The subjugation of non-humans, of the proletariat... Of women... Yes. Us...! Make no mistake. The Proxima system is thoroughly and oppressively patriarchal, and Scarn is nothing if not misogynistic. Those values are going to dominate throughout the galaxy if he is allowed to win."

"Is this actually going somewhere...?"

"I have helped to build a very worthwhile enterprise out here. A trading hub, a centre for commerce, for cultural exchange. In time, perhaps, a place where diplomatic alliances can be formed that will shape the future of our depleted human race!" Having risen as she spoke, Servalan's voice quietened again. "I contemplated my predicament... and found myself thinking... What we need _now_ is another Blake... Believe me, I'm not unappreciative of the irony. Then along _you_ came..."

Mara laughed, and at length got up off her chair. "This is sick..." She turned to go, and looked back over her shoulder. " _You're_ sick."

"I assure you, I am quite well."

"All these years later... You still haven't stopped... The Federation isn't dead. It's sitting right here in front of me." She moved toward the door. "I _am_ free to go, I assume... Or perhaps I shouldn't assume that..."

"You have the freedom of Galaxy City... Within certain obvious restrictions."

"Of course, Madam President... Or is it Supreme Commander...? Or Commissioner... I'm not really sure."

As Mara walked away, Servalan added just one more thing. "What if Blake had had the chance to strangle the Federation in its cradle...? What then...?"

* * *

**Pelios**

If Alek, Mara or Caul had entertained any illusions about the finality of their escape, they were soon to be corrected. Several ships belonging to the invaders had stayed in space, and some were sent in pursuit as soon as _their_ little vessel broke orbit and became visible to their scanners.

The atmosphere on the flight-deck was tense. "Any more ideas...?" Mara demanded with a fatalistic lightness.

Alek was exhausted, more so than he could ever remember being at any point in his life. He had anticipated this situation, of course, but till now had simply kicked it down the line and hoped that a solution would present itself. "I think it's somebody else's turn" he replied irritably.

Mara's heart was thumping as she said, mouth dry "What about the barycentre...?"

There was a long, terribly long, moment of silence. Wondering if they just hadn't grasped her idea, Mara elaborated. "Ride the barycentre."

"Risky." That was apparently all Alek had to say, but she could see he was thinking intently.

"Well, we might have all the relevant data somewhere... _They_ probably don't yet... They haven't had time to take observations..."

Alek was already searching the database. "Fuck!" he roared.

"Does that mean we don't have it...?" Mara turned, irritated at the sound of furious tapping at the console next to her - Now she thought about it, it had started a few moments earlier, as soon as she had made her suggestion.

Caul turned to her, eyes wild with apparent glee. "Data entered..." he said. "I, uh, processed the most recent readings yesterday..." he added almost apologetically as he saved their lives.

 _...Possibly_ saved them.

"Show me..." Mara hunched over her monitor as Caul's data started to come through. It was what she needed - the precise mass, relative positions and gravitational profile of Pelios's three suns. Cross-checked with a precise temporal reading courtesy of the computer, it would be all they needed... She turned back to Alek for a final decision.

"Do it" he commanded.

* * *

Their ship shot forward, engines at full-burn, through the infinitesimally narrow corridor between the fluctuating gravitational forces of the trinary stars - Riding the barycentre, as Mara had put it. The pursuing ships came forward more cautiously and some indeed saw the danger and their more cautious captains ordered a course-change even if it did risk failure. Others just continued on their course, oblivious to the danger or else so intent on their mission that nothing could distract them.

One by one, they fell foul. Their engines could not possibly generate enough thrust to escape the pull of the three suns, and the pursuing ships were dragged, slowly but inexorably, off course. It might take some time, but they would all end up being drawn closer and closer until the radiation destroyed them.

 _Flame_ escaped.

* * *

Alek, Mara and Caul quickly settled into taking an inventory of their stores, as well as a multitude of other tasks, as they prepared their vessel for the rigors of deep space. The one thing none of them did was talk about what had just happened. For now, there were simply no words.

Pelios was lost.

* * *

**Galaxy City**

Trained from an early age to anticipate danger in a hundred different ways, Rissa was nothing if not sensitive to non-verbal signals, and so when Juni approached the waiting area outside Madame Orella's suite, she knew to make herself scarce for a while - Juni's brief glance at her as they passed each other was sufficient acknowledgment.

"Faal..." Juni approached the tall Clone Master with far less hesitation than before - Since then, she had had time to think. "I want to know what it is."

"Juni..." he acknowledged, and then settled down again to await his appointment.

"I want to know."

"I'm very sorry, Juni, I really don't know what you want of me."

"Why you've been trying to avoid me, ever since..." She collected her thoughts, and again found herself fingering the Arcturan pearl on its chain around her neck. "I thought we..."

"I'm sorry."

"Stop saying you're sorry!"

"My apologies. Standard is not my first tongue, as you know. I find the automatic translator devices somewhat crude, and my own mastery is not quite"-

-"So now you're hiding behind that...? Your Standard is flawless, and you know it. What happened, Faal...?"

He turned to face her. "I don't think I can give you what you seem to require of me. My people"-

-"You have no people, Faal. Not any more." That was said gently, but firmly, as if to point out that he was not going to be allowed to hide behind that either. "So, last of the Clone Masters, you're either going to have to come up with something better than that, or tell me the truth..." Her tone hardened. "Or should I ask _her_?"

"Please don't do that."

"You honestly think she knows nothing? _Her_...?" She pulled the pearl to the limit of the chain and brushed it against her lips as she thought. "Is it something to do with the accident...? It must be, because before that"-

-"Please... Stop asking me these things. I can't..."

"Can't what, Faal? Can't tell me why I survived...? Why I alone survived on that shuttle when all the others died...? Why I can remember so many things with such clarity but can't remember anything about that day or for weeks after it...?"

"That is not uncommon."

She peered closely at the pearl and, after a moment, bowed her head and carefully took it off. Holding it by the chain, she held it out towards him.

"I'm not going to take that back..." he said quietly, believing he understood the symbolic importance of the gesture. "It's yours."

"I'm not giving it back. I just want you to look at it." He sensed some kind of trap but had no idea how to avoid it - Seeing little choice, he took the Arcturan pearl and held it out between them. Waiting for further instructions.

"Look at it..." she said, voice barely a whisper.

"What am I looking for...?" He was just playing for time, and found himself examining the object closely, from all angles. At length, he saw what she was driving at. His eyes snapped back to meet hers. "I see nothing" he lied.

"Yes, you do... Arcturan pearls are all unique, that's what you said. All. No two the same. Seldom are they even broadly similar." She took it back, and put it back around her neck. "I know every contour of this one. Every bump, every groove... Every flaw."

His eyes closed.

"This one is flawless..." she continued. "But it didn't used to be." She ran a finger delicately over the area on the pearl where the fault line used to be - He tried to move away, but she clutched his arm. "Why is that, Faal...?"

He pulled away, and moved toward the door, and the company of the guard. Anyone. Anything to make this conversation stop. _"Why is that...?"_ Juni hissed.

The guard indicated they should go in, and she hurriedly composed herself. Whatever her misgivings over the growing feeling that something was being hidden from her, not for anything would she disappoint Madame Orella.

* * *

"Is this how you plan to spend your time now...?" Darvin approached the table where Mara sat, overlooking the main hub, and slowly took up a chair - She could hear the mechanics of his artificial leg operating as he did so, and for some reason found the noise hilarious and had to stop herself laughing. He looked pointedly at the drink she was nursing, clearly not her first. Or second.

"How else should the daughter of a sex-slave and a clone spend her time...?" She gazed at him with disinterest. "Oh, yes... That's right... I should save humanity from its oppressors... That's all... No pressure."

"You might be misunderstanding what exactly Orella is offering you."

" _No_ , I get it. I'll be the public face, she'll be the one pulling the strings. Her new Travis... Oh _no_ , _sorry_ , that's you, of course."

His artificial hand tapped onto the table. "That was low."

" _That's_ how I plan to spend my time. Being low."

"That _name_ you've been taking upon yourself, on and off... It means something to a lot of people out there..."

_"Please..."_

"All right..." Darvin sat back. "All right."

"What do you mean...?"

"I mean... all right." He stood up and started to leave.

"Wait..." she said - Back turned, Darvin smiled.

"All of it..." she continued. "All of it was for this..." She looked down. "I've killed people to get here... because I thought it was worth it. I thought it would be justified... And for what...? You really think Ser-" She stopped herself. -"You think _she_ is so much better than this Scarn...? Why should I care which of them rules?"

Darvin turned back. "Yeah... All right, I get it. You obviously know quite a bit about her, maybe more in some ways than I do... But I was _there_ when..."

"When _what_ , Stev?"

"When... Let's just say, I wonder if one day, if you ever find yourself faced with the sort of decisions she had to make, I wonder if when that day comes you might see things a little bit differently."

"You're talking about the war... again."

"Yes! I'm talking about the war. While you were growing up back there on your little backwater planet... Not even knowing there _was_ a war... We were faced with an enemy so... vastly superior, so... _so_ hostile - so _relentless_..." He stared at her intently, eyes haunted. "She stopped them... Somehow... Not for long, but somehow she turned us around and we started winning battles. _Oh_ , it cost us, but it gave us a little time... And that's when she did it..."

" _What_ did she do...?" Mara was still a little scornful, reluctant to let go of her resentment.

"The end had come... The end of the entire human race. No one believed we could win... Except her. What we didn't know was, she had one more weapon. One last resort, for when everything else failed. She set _him_ free, and in the end he found a way, a terrible way, to save us all."

"Avon."

" _Avon_."

"He came up with that... peppering."

"All the technology already existed... The means existed. But only a mind like his could cut through it... Think the unthinkable. And of course he _knew_ , he could present the options, but he didn't actually have to do it. _He_ didn't have to give the order. _He_ didn't have to pull the switch."

"She did."

"That's right."

"She killed... What...? Half the human race? More than half...?"

"To save the rest of it. Yes. I was there when she did it... What would you have done...?"

"And where was Avon...?"

"There's another story..."

"So tell it. I don't appear to be going anywhere."

"Not one _I_ can tell... Maybe one day, she'll tell you about Avon and the Andromedan Inquisitor-General..."

" _Where_ is he...?"

"No one knows...! What do you think she's spent the last fifteen years doing...? Once he had his freedom again, Avon was impossible to control. And after the Andromedans captured and interrogated him... Well, he was the first ever to come back from that, and when he did he was... different... Then, not long after that, he disappeared... and she's been looking for him ever since."

"Why is it so important she finds him...?"

Darvin took a while to form a reply. "I think that might be _complicated_."

* * *

**A planet in one of the outer spiral arms of the galaxy...**

_"Adran!"_

The boy sighed, and turned back. "What...?"

"You know you've gone too far this time. Get back here...!"

"Not this time!"

"You know we're not allowed out here. It's dangerous."

"Who says...?"

"You _know_ who says...!"

Adran's answer was carried away by a sudden gust of wind across the valley, but his sister was fairly sure the second word was _him_.

"What do you think you're going to find over there anyway...?" she called.

"The unknown!"

"Oh, don't talk nonsense!"

"All right then... The King...!"

His sister laughed. "Will you at least let me catch up...?!"

"All right then! Hurry up!" Adran waited impatiently as his sister ran to catch up with him, holding her flowing skirts in place as the wind caught them. "All right..." he said. "What...?"

"You were supposed to be gathering wood. I don't see too many trees around here... They don't grow this far out."

"They probably don't like the wind."

"Why do you call him that...?"

"Who?"

_"The King..."_

"Because that's what he is. He's a great King, forced into exile, awaiting the right time to return and claim back his kingdom."

"Who says that...?"

He looked away. "Can't remember..." He fiddled with a loose rock from the outcrop they were leaning against. "It _feels_ like the truth..." he mused.

"Anyway, there's more than _one_ of them living over there... I've seen _two_ men _and_ a lady, and Kera has seen another man who didn't sound like _any_ of the ones I've seen..."

"A lady...?"

"Yes."

"Didn't know that... What was she like...?"

"Oh, you know... Older, but not _old_... Nice, but... sad."

"Dad said, when he first heard that place was occupied again, they took a scanner out to the edge to see how many there were, and there was just one."

"He also said the scanner started showing all sorts of crazy things that weren't possible, and then packed up. Believe me, _I've_ seen more than one."

"More than one at a time...?"

She looked at him questioningly. "No, but what does that prove...? Are you trying to say they're all the same man in disguise...?"

_"That would be quite a disguise..."_

Both their heads snapped round, startled, at the unexpected voice. The newcomer had appeared from round the other side of the outcrop, Adran realised - He must have ducked down there as he heard them approach.

"Just what have you seen...?" the man asked, his voice only just loud enough to be heard over the wind.

"Well, I've seen _you_..." Adran replied, keen not to give the impression that he was in any way scared. "Just _you_. Going to the market to buy food."

"And I thought I was so _clever_ , going in under cover of daylight." The man was older than almost anyone Adran had ever seen - older than Grandad had been when he died - but still strong. He wore rough homespun clothing like theirs and a battered old hat that cast a shadow over part of his face. His jaw was set, his expression somehow... cruel.

No, not cruel. Indifferent. Like he wouldn't ever go out of his way to harm you, but if you got _in_ his way that was just too bad.

"I've seen others..." said his sister. "Your friends."

"Friends...?" The man smiled, but coldly. "Interesting. What are they like...?"

"There's a big man, about your age... A kind man. He smiled at me, and I liked the way his face went all creased when he smiled..."

"Who else...?" The king in exile seemed genuinely fascinated, a fact Adran found a little strange.

"Another man... I wasn't too sure about him at first, but he's kind too... He did a trick for me and Kera..."

"And you said Kera had seen a lady..." Adran prompted. That really got the man's attention, which had been drifting somewhat.

"No..." his sister corrected him. "I saw the lady."

"And what was she like...?" asked the man.

"You don't know?"

"Perhaps... I want to know what you think."

"What do you all do in that place...?" his sister asked, sulky now, tired of what had been an amusing game to start with.

"All...?" The man leaned a little closer. "There is no _all_. There's just me."

"I've seen the others."

"Perhaps..." he suggested "They're ghosts."

"...There's no such thing."

"Perhaps one day..." replied Avon - "You'll find that's _all_ there is left."


	10. Chapter 10

**Former deep space freighter "Flame", 4.5 weeks after the fall of Pelios**

As was often the case, Mara and Caul exchanged no words as they changed shift on their vessel's flight-deck - Mara assumed that if anything had happened that was important enough to be shared but not important enough to summon her, he would let her know.

In any case, as she took up her place at the controls of _Flame_ \- she was not exactly sure why she had settled on that name for their new home - she already had a lot to think about. As Caul well knew.

At least, she assumed he knew. They hadn't really talked about it.

"How's he doing...?" Caul broke the silence.

"No different..." Mara replied as she checked the automatic logs. "Go and see him. I think he's still awake."

"All right..." Caul turned back just before exiting. "I'm _sure_..." She never found out exactly what he was sure of, as he never finished the sentence.

_"You have to look after him..."_

She had given that no reply at the time Alek had actually said it, having been taken so aback, but now Mara was just itching to reply.

"Why do _I_ need to look after _him_...? Why can't we just look after each other...? Why is everything suddenly on _me_...?" As the aged control switches refused to engage the way they should, in a burst of temper she forced one into place.

 _"Caul was in many ways ideally suited to life in the Habitat..."_ Alek had continued, pausing a lot to form his words with even more care than usual - or was he just in more pain than he was admitting to...? _"But the wider galaxy will probably not be quite so ideal. There are things out there... He will need you... Someone who understands his condition..."_

 _"Condition..."_ Mara said quietly. "What _condition_? Why does he need to have a _condition_? Why can't he just be Caul? And why do you...?"- She closed her eyes and paused for a while before continuing. "Why can't you just... _stay_? You weren't ill when we were on Pelios. You were more alive than anyone I've ever"-

She rubbed the emerging tears from her eyes, even knowing that she was making the mild infection in one of them worse. "Why does this have to happen now...?" she asked the empty flight deck.

The intercom crackled into life, and she started. Somehow knowing what was coming...

She pictured Caul's hesitation on the other end... _No, don't say it... If you don't say it, then for a while longer it just hasn't happened... Don't say it, Caul... Please..._

_"Mara... I'm... I'm sorry... Alek has... Well, he's... dead. Alek is dead. It must have been just after you... left."_

"Understood..." she heard herself say calmly, and the intercom switched off. Mara leaned back in the flight chair.

_It's all right. Until I see it, it hasn't happened. And I haven't seen it yet. Till then, I'm just going to look after this ship for a few hours. That, I can do... Then, after that, we'll see..._

_Maybe I'll let it have happened then._

* * *

They watched on the monitor as the shrouded body was blasted into the void, where it spun a few times before the gases released with it dissipated into space and Alek's body settled into a gentler forward motion and slow rotation. It was visible to them for a couple of minutes before it disappeared from view.

She was holding Caul's hand, a fact Mara hadn't really registered till then, so numb was she. They stood there like that for a while until, at a certain point, it felt right to let go, and they got on with the running of the ship.

The past was behind. Where the future lay was less simple.

* * *

"Where do we go...?" she had asked Alek as soon as they had the chance to speak after their hasty escape from Pelios.

He had seemed strangely reticent to express a view on the matter, but when at last she had managed to corner him into a reply he had said "I thought I would leave that up to you..." and left it at that.

Some time later, after they had dealt with their most urgent supply problems, she had broached the matter again. This time he had asked her more directly - "What do _you_ want to do...?" She had decided by then.

"Gauda Prime..." said Mara. "I want to find out what happened... I want to know. I want to know _everything_."

* * *

**5 months later**

* * *

The stranger - the King in exile, as Adran still thought of him - quickly obtained his supplies in the encampment, oblivious or just plain indifferent as ever to the vague suspicions of the scavengers, and then started out for home. The boy accompanied him some of the way, and if he did not welcome the company the older man didn't choose to say so - Adran took that as tacit permission to tag along.

After a while he felt bold enough to strike up a conversation as they walked. "Why do you live over in that place...? Why don't you join us in the encampment? You could work, you're still able..."

"Why would I do that?"

"Because then you wouldn't be alone. You did say you were alone."

"And I would be welcome, would I...?"

"Before long. We take all sorts, my dad says... No questions asked."

"Perhaps I need certain things that are only available... in that place." He turned to look at Adran for a moment. "Had you considered that?"

"No." The boy thought for a while. "Don't you get lonely?"

"No."

"Not ever?"

"No."

Adran shrugged. "I get that. I'd like to be alone too."

"You've picked an odd way to further that ambition."

"I mean, family is overrated, isn't it...?"

"I wouldn't really know."

"Soon as I'm able to, I'm going to go off by myself and explore this place."

That made Avon stop for a moment. He seemed reluctant to speak, wrestling briefly with some inner conflict. "I wouldn't stray too far from your ships."

"The ships...?" Adran responded incredulously. "The ships are rubbish. I think probably half of them can't fly any more."

"Repair them. Cannibalise some to repair the others if you have to. Whatever you have to do. _This_ is the only warning you're likely to get."

"You mean, leave here...?"

"Yes."

"Why?"

"Because something is going to happen."

"Something bad?"

Avon shrugged. "It depends on your point of view."

* * *

**DSV-A1, Deep space, 676,849 spacials from designated embarkation point...**

_Internal configuration in flux... Parameters being defined... Processing... Processing... Life support systems on line... Specified compartments ready for habitation.  
_

_Confirmed._

* * *

**Galaxy City**

"Our first priority should be to double the security at the following points..." said Servalan very precisely. "The airlocks, obviously... Entrances to the hub... though preferably not too openly... The armory, and small arms lockups... And, this being possibly the most vital, the gravity drive..." She looked round at Juni, Faal and the City's head of security - a slightly portly, thick-necked man named Ramm - "...Well, don't everyone speak at once."

"A good approach, Madame..." said Ramm - Servalan for some reason always found herself fascinated by the single fleshy fold of skin that formed at the base of his skull when he sat back in one of her chairs, and had to stop herself staring at it. "And exactly the approach I had planned to take... Add to it my mobile reserve force, ready to respond to the area of greatest need... Should any crisis actually arise, that is..."

"And you two...?"

In contrast to Ramm's relaxed posture, Juni and Faal both sat straight-backed, avoiding each others' gaze - Even someone far less observant than Servalan, Ramm for example, could have noted the tension hanging over them. Servalan had no patience for any such distractions at this point, and was determined to shock them out of it.

Whatever _it_ was. She had some notion, but was hoping somewhat against hope that she was wrong.

"Yes..." Juni's attention snapped into focus, and she met Servalan's eye with a cool, consciously professional demeanor. "Yes, Madame Orella. The need for possibly extensive overtime has been discussed with _all_ our security personnel, and all are amenable."

"Good for them." Only someone like Juni who knew her well would have detected the faint hint of danger in Servalan's tone. "Faal...?"

"Madame...?" Like Juni, Faal quickly pulled himself together. "Nothing unusual to report."

"Your people are ready, should any... threat emerge...?"

"My _people_..."

"The technicians are, I believe, operating at maximum efficiency..." Juni interrupted, rescuing Faal, and perhaps throwing the briefest glance his way while doing so.

"I'm glad to hear you say so..." Servalan sighed, if only inwardly. None of them could possibly know how difficult it had been for her, all those years ago, to adjust to managing an organisation where the best results were genuinely obtained by treating her subordinates like human beings - even the ones who weren't quite. After clawing her way by any means necessary to the very top of the Federation hierarchy - twice!

Sometimes, the sheer effort of it began to tell on her... On days such as these. "Well..." she said. "That will do for now... We will resume at the same time tomorrow... assuming nothing changes drastically in the meantime, that is..."

The other three got up to leave, Ramm draining his drink appreciatively having refilled it more than once during the meeting. Juni hung back and seemed to want to add something, and Servalan dismissed her with a faint smile that said _Later_. "Faal..." she said, her voice gentle. "Stay a moment, please."

He did so, reluctantly, and she waited till the others were away before she said anything. "Madame..." he began, before she cut him off.

-"Have you told her?"

"No."

"Good. At least there is that."

"I think she knows anyway. Or is close to working it out."

"That would be unfortunate..." Servalan pointed out, turning to look at him. "For both of us. Why does she suspect?"

"Because she is intelligent..." Faal answered immediately. "There are discrepancies in the official account... Unavoidable ones."

"Yes, I suppose so..." Servalan looked weary for the first time. "I almost wish she was a less perfect copy. Less intelligent than my dear girl was, and more easily deceived... But then, that wouldn't be... What would be the point...?" Faal almost thought that was it and, anticipating dismissal, started to turn toward the door, but Servalan's next words turned his blood cold.

"Have you resumed your relationship...?" she asked calmly.

"Madame, I"-

-"Or rather, have you begun one with her on the same terms you had with the original Juni? Let me stop you before you make the mistake of lying to me. And inform you that I knew of your relationship with her very promptly indeed. Bright she certainly was, but capable of hiding anything from me...? _No_."

Faal addressed the initial question. "I am not pursuing any relationship beyond the most functional professional one. To do otherwise would be against the basic tenets governing the Clone Master's life and work."

"Have you considered that might be a mistake?"

"Madame...?" Faal's mind was reeling - Having dreaded the prospect of Orella finding out about his _weakness_ , this last question was forcing him into very uncertain territory.

"A happy girl, buzzing with all those lovely youthful hormonal feelings... She might be less inclined to spot the discrepancies you mentioned... And even less likely to care if she does." Servalan's eyes clouded over. " _Believe_ me, I know."

"In this, Madame..." Faal said, "I stand ready to abide by your preferred course."

"The most intelligent among us are often capable of remarkable feats of self-deception" she continued. "You'd be surprised... Or perhaps not. After all, you did deceive yourself that you had managed to hide your liason from me." She smiled broadly, but that just made him more uneasy.

"What do you plan to do?"

"Too early to say..." Servalan had a brief moment of looking almost vulnerable, but soon recovered. "Which I suppose is just another way of saying _I don't know_..." She looked at him pensively. "I suppose I'm lucky it's only _you_ who heard me say that."

Lost for any other kind of response, Faal simply inclined his head - That usually sufficed for any exchange with a human in authority, but then none of them had ever been quite like this one.

"You heard the recording? Of my conversation with our guest...?" Servalan changed tack very quickly, but Faal immediately knew what she was referring to.

"Yes."

"Nothing to say...? About my handling of her questions...?"

"I saw it as your prerogative to withhold information, if you saw fit."

"I didn't so much withhold information as just lie to her. Which may yet prove to be a mistake, _I don't know_... The clone Blake was not capable of producing a child. That is correct, is it not?"

"That is so" he confirmed. "Although sexually functional, that type of clone was never designed to be genetically compatible with a human being."

"Something like yourself, eh, Faal...?" Servalan quickly added "I'm sorry, do forgive that. A rare lapse."

"Madame."

"While the girl thinks she is most likely Blake's daughter - in a manner of speaking - She may yet be able to work with us. But if she learns that her father is _more likely_... Well, I wouldn't want to learn that a man like Coser... Oh, never mind..."

"Madame...?"

"This is the worst part, Faal. Where everything is in the air at once... And no one knows how any of it will land..."

* * *

"I'm sorry..." said Brintun. "I've forgotten your name."

"My name is of little importance..." replied Miko serenely. "I am here to speak for the Children."

"Well, I was rather hoping to speak to some grownups at this point, if that could possibly be arranged..." Brintun's voice was brittle.

"We are all Children in the Light of the One." Miko met the UniS representative's challenge with a level, unconcerned gaze.

Brintun cleared his throat with a short, sharp sound. _"Yes."_

The two of them sat facing each other in one of Galaxy City's opulent guest suites, with several of President Scarn's whey-faced courtiers watching the verbal bout with dead-eyed indifference. Brintun knew, however, these cronies of the President would report every word they heard, and what's more every word would be weighed carefully for any potential advantage to them in their backstabbing route to the top of Scarn's inner circle.

As the man currently at the apex of that structure - and keenly aware that a circle does not normally have an apex - Brintun was always conscious of their scrutiny.

"Be assured..." Miko went on, "Your concerns regarding our alliance are well-known"-

-"Indeed...?"

"...And your counseling your President against an understanding with the Children of Light was, seen in the light of mere political expediency, perfectly sensible..."

"Thank you."

"But seen in the true Light, that is the Light of the judgment that awaits us all, it is clear, Mister Brintun, that your path is a rocky one..."

Brintun glanced briefly at his feet, clad in Federation-issue boots. "I'm always prepared for rough terrain."

"We all think we are prepared. But each of us, when the time comes, must face the Light in our own unique way..." Miko's scarred face took on a peculiar quality when he smiled, as he did now, the still-livid scar puckering in a way that was unpleasant to behold. Brintun found his distaste more and more difficult to disguise.

"It seems to me your religion is a peculiar mix of several ancient superstitions, with disparate bits and pieces of mythology all forced in and made to fit this... agenda you have... Interesting from an anthropological perspective if nothing else..."

"And yet your President Scarn chooses to ally himself with us... Perhaps he sees the way clearer than you do."

One of the chairs creaked as the courtier slumped in it stirred in anticipation of overhearing a treasonous exchange, but Brintun was not so easily drawn. "President Scarn is a survivor, above all..." he said with admiration that was not entirely forced. "Great empires have come and gone, and he has endured. Now is his time."

"Well, on that we can agree..." said Miko, his tone investing his words - apparently inconsequential to any disembodied listener - with additional meaning to those present. "Now _is_ the time."

* * *

The UniS flagship _Leviathan_ hung in space just far enough away from Galaxy City to avoid detection, its support craft buzzing around it like worker bees - There was more activity than was usual at the moment, as a transfer of personnel was underway.

His enormous frame squeezed into a flight chair, President Scarn endured the brief journey by shuttle from Leviathan to his waiting launch - An elegant vessel reminiscent in its shape and colours of some exotic bird, built for speed and charged with returning the President home, his duties here discharged.

First, however, there was one more task to be performed.

* * *

 _"I think it would be true to say, Sol... This is make or break for your plan..."_ Scarn remonstrated over the private, scrambled video link. Brintun received it in the guest suite, using his own equipment and confident that their exchange would avoid the scrutiny of eavesdroppers.

"I understand that" Brintun replied calmly, the sweat still nonetheless pouring off him in waves.

_"Let's not have to break anything, eh...?"_

"A sentiment we can all agree with."

_"I don't necessarily ask for agreement, Sol. Just good advice. And at certain times, just obedience."_

"That is _certainly_ understood."

_"So long as it is. Is everything in hand?"_

"Everything is prepared."

_"Good. Contact me on Proxima III when the site is secured."_

"Acknowledged."

_"I look forward to it."_

"As do I." As the video link cut out, Brintun looked up to see his guards ushering a visitor into the suite - A powerful stocky figure squeezed into one of the resplendent uniforms of Galaxy City's security force.

"How goes...?" asked the man cheerily, noisily chomping on a piece of fruit grabbed from the hub's marketplace en route to the guest suite.

"A question..." Brintun mused coldly, "I was about to put to you, Mister Ramm..."

* * *

**DSV-A1, Deep space, 459,236 spacials from designated embarkation point...**

_Deep Space Vehicle now on state of alert... All automatic defence systems in readiness... Combat readiness to be maintained. Hostile scrutiny to be discouraged..._

__Confirmed._ _

* * *

Admiral Zanso stalked onto the vast bridge of _Leviathan_ in ill temper - None of the crew present were surprised, or even particularly blamed him. The distinguished officer, a veteran of the Intergalactic Wars, had been thoroughly sidelined on his own vessel, and only now was he able to exert his own authority without the overpowering presence of the President or his oily advisor.

"Situation report...!" the gaunt flag officer barked, and all present hurried to assemble one.

_"Flotilla maintaining station within acceptable parameters, sir..."_

_"Nothing on scopes... No, wait..."_

"Wait...?" Zanso demanded incredulously. "You tell your Admiral to wait...?"

_"Apologies, sir... I had something there... Just for a moment... Then it was gone... Trying to get it back..."_

"Well..." Zanso somewhat regretted his brief outburst - He took no pride at all in letting recent pressures get to him in that way. "Report as soon as you have it."

_"Sir."_

* * *

"Hey there."

"Hey..." Rissa moved her seat at the bar over slightly to let the bulky figure sit next to her - the man she had assisted against Scarn's heavy-handed security.

"Thanks" he said, as he silently negotiated a drink from the barkeeper.

"Wasn't a problem..." she said. "In fact, I enjoyed it. I'd been cooped up on the ship for a while, and that was just what I needed."

"I like that..." he said, smiling, and swigged from the tall glass the keep had just put in front of him. "Watch yourself, though..."

"How'd you mean...?"

"I hear things, that's all... Don't underestimate UniS. They mean to have this place - the whole thing."

"You think Madame Orella will let that happen?"

"Some think she's lost her edge a bit. But anyway, I just thought I'd best warn you - something is going _down_..."

"Well, thanks for that..."

"Least I could do." He drained his drink and stood, clasping her hand in his massive one for a moment. Then he left, leaving her lost in thought.

Darvin arrived from the other side, and sat in the just-vacated seat next to her. Caul came up to stand next to him, looking like he would rather be anywhere else, and wiped at a stain on the bar with his sleeve. A blood stain, as Rissa well knew - she had caused it to be there. She grinned at the memory - that guy had _truly_ deserved it.

"I've just been talking to Caul..." Darvin said.

"Oh yes...?" She looked over at Caul casually and winked, receiving a vague smile in response. "And what has our very handy new friend been saying...?"

"He's only agreed to join us, that's all..." Darvin said cheerily.

"If Mara does..." Caul added. "I think she _will_." Darvin and Rissa exchanged glances, and then realised that the subject of their speculation was actually walking calmly around the perimeter of the bar area and round toward them.

"Hi, _you_...!" Rissa called. "Sorry for pointing the gun at you, but it was orders..."

"It's all right..." Mara said, slightly detached. "I've had a bit of time to think."

"Thinking is overrated" said Rissa.

"Thinking _has its place_..." Darvin countered. "But has it resulted in any _deciding_...?"

"Well, I've decided I'll join your crew..." said Mara. "If the offer stands. As for the rest..."

"Yeah...?"

She was about to reply, but at that moment the lights suddenly cut out and emergency lighting kicked in. Darvin and Rissa were on their feet instantly, and leading their new friends away from the bar. "This way..." said Darvin. "We don't wanna get caught in here..."

"What's happening...?"

"Fun fun fun..." said Rissa, but her subdued demeanor belied the glee her words suggested. "Those fools have actually decided to go for it."

"We don't know that..." said Darvin. "It could be any number of things."

"Hey...! Infallible instincts, right here..."

"Yeah, I forgot... Well, Miss Infallible Instincts, let's just get to the small arms, shall we...?"

"You go for the small arms. I want one of those things that fires rockets...!"

* * *

Servalan was relaxing in her sitting area when not one but two calls came through on her private comm-system. Recognising one, she gave it priority. "Yes...?!"

 _"It's happening..."_ said Darvin - A moment after he said that, the base alert came up on her wall monitor, and a klaxon sounded outside.

"Al right..." she snapped. "Follow the plan."

_"Already on my way. Pick you up in... ten...?"_

"Make sure you do..." Servalan walked over to a dressing table and sat before it. After a moment, staring at her reflected image, she carefully took off her black bob-cut hair and set it aside - Beneath, her actual steel-grey hair was cut short.

 _"Soon..."_ she said quietly. Then, remembering the other call, she switched channels with her remote device. "What is it...?"

 _"Sorry to disturb you, Madame..."_ said an unfamiliar voice. _"But you did say to tell you... That signal you had us analyse..."_

"What about it?"

_"It's coming in now... It's being beamed directly at us...!"_

"Find the source!" Servalan rushed out of her sitting area and up the stairs to the guest reception area and her private collection of art - There she stood and gaped for a moment.

The box had come to life - lights activated within and an electronic hum that she had not heard for decades filled the room. "Orac!"

Barely had the box come to life than all signs of activity ceased, and it once more became dormant - Servalan moved toward it, incredulous. "No!" she cried. "No!"

Her fist slammed down on Orac with as much force as she could muster. _"No!"_

* * *

"Ready the ship...!" Darvin yelled into his wrist communicator, and turned to the others as they walked urgently in one of the City's service corridors. "Just in case..." he said, almost sheepish.

They turned at a junction and found themselves faced with the business-end of a gun, though Juni pulled the weapon up to point at the ceiling when she recognised them. Faal was with her, and he was not armed.

None of them could quite see Faal with a gun, though the time might come...

"Where are you going...?" Juni snapped, her indifferent gaze taking in all of them and zeroing in on Darvin.

"Small arms, then to evacuate _herself_... And by a remarkable coincidence that's where _you're_ going now as well... Consider yourself under my command now, OK...?"

"Your command...?"

"That's right. Check with her when we've got her safely on board _Revenant_ , by all means. It's all arranged."

"Arranged...? By you...? Why wasn't I kept informed...?"

"I don't know... Ask her that as well..." Darvin made reproachful eye contact with Faal as he said that.

"Two groups...!" Juni said decisively. "You secure the weapons, I'll bring her to you and then we'll all proceed from there." Darvin clearly would have liked to be able to dismiss that, but he knew it made sense.

"All right..."

"Faal, with me..." Juni said, and turned to leave.

"Take one more..." Darvin interrupted, and looking round he settled on Mara. "OK...?" he asked her.

"Of course."

Juni looked uncertain, but for the sake of getting away she settled. "Come with me... Don't fall behind."

* * *

**DSV-A1, Deep space, 47 spacials from designated embarkation point...**

_Mission reaching crisis point... Potential hostiles now on scanner scopes... Weapon systems on line... Damage control procedures in readiness - energy transfer from internal configuration programs confirmed... Concomitant delay of_ _internal configuration procedure now being calculated...  
_

_Confirmed._

* * *

Menacingly, _Leviathan_ approached the planetoid hosting Galaxy City, settling into geostationary orbit - and for Admiral Zanso, that was where it all started to go wrong.

_"Detectors offline, sir!"_

"Restore them!" the Admiral demanded.

_"Trying, sir... No response. It's possible they've been blocked deliberately."_

"Possible...? Since when has that been possible...?"

_"Don't know, sir..."_

* * *

"About time!" Juni snapped as a squad of guards led by their Chief came up to join them - Ramm looked the three of them over.

"This all...?" he asked. "No Darvin...? Or that girl with the eyes...?" Something made Mara uneasy, and she was about to warn Juni when at that point such a warning was rendered obsolete - Ramm's men turned their weapons on them, and on Faal.

"You're coming with us..." Ramm breathed. Surprisingly he spoke not to Juni but to Faal - Reflexively, the tall Clone Master had stepped between him and Juni, and Ramm noted that. "Her as well..." he added to his men, indicating Juni.

"Are you out of your mind, Ramm...?" Juni demanded as she and Faal were dragged away, a question he ignored - He glanced at Mara and seemed to dismiss her instantly. "Um... You two, find somewhere and guard _this_ one..." he said, as if annoyed at having to engage with such a minor detail.

Not resisting, Mara was led away. Now was not the time.

* * *

"That was our own people...!" Darvin was incredulous as he, Rissa and Caul found themselves pinned down on the approach to the arms lockers. "What...?"

Rissa watched coolly as some of their own security men circled above them on a narrow gantry - In a moment, they would be able to target them. "Darvin...!"

He saw the danger, thinking furiously. "All right... Not much choice then... With me...?"

"Have been up to now."

"Count to three... One...!" Taking Caul as much by surprise as the enemy, Darvin and Rissa scrambled out of cover and charged headlong at their opponents, yelling as they went...

* * *

The two guards brought Mara to a storage room with only one door in and out, apparently with a view to adding other prisoners as their mutiny progressed. She perched on a neatly-stacked heap of large shiny tins as one guard took up a position near the door, gun trained on her. The other one took up his station outside.

 _Still_ not quite the time.

* * *

"Get me the landing party!" Admiral Zanso barked savagely to the bridge personnel of _Leviathan_ , his patience long since run out.

_"Impossible sir... All communications with the surface blocked..."_

"Well, get them unblocked...!"

_"Sir...!"_

"What now...?"

The navigator was studying the readings on the panel. "Detectors were restored for a moment there, sir... They showed... something..."

"Anything better than that to offer?" the Admiral said dangerously.

"It's coming round toward us, sir... The alien... It's big, as big as we are. At least..."

"Nothing's as big as _Leviathan_..." The Admiral pushed him aside and studied the data himself. "Could it be an Andromedan ship...?" he whispered - He had always feared it wasn't really over...

"Whatever it is, sir..." the navigator said, "We'll be able to see it momentarily... _Yeah..._ Here it comes..."

* * *

Anyone looking out of one of _Leviathan_ 's aft viewing ports would have seen the horizon briefly distort as the unidentified object came into view in the extreme distance, and the light of the star behind it momentarily flare as it passed between it and the UniS flagship.

Getting closer.

* * *

**DSV-A1, Deep space, 0.5 spacials from designated embarkation point...**

_Teleport system on line. Ready to engage program 17... Confirmed._

* * *

Mara was staring intently at the guard left to look after her, willing him to make some kind of mistake, when the opportunity she had hoped for came out of nowhere.

It started when the comm-panel on the wall behind him beeped. "Yes" the guard said irritably, awkwardly keeping Mara covered with one hand while holding the switch with the other. "Yes...?" he said again when there was no answer.

Finally, a voice emerged from the speaker, but it wasn't speaking to him. It simply said, in what sounded like the prissy tones of an elderly academic - and on Pelios Mara had met a few of those - _"You, girl... Breath-mask."_

It was all the warning she needed - Mara took advantage of the guard's consternation to retrieve the breath-mask she had used on Danteron from the capacious pockets of her trousers, and put it to her face, as the doors to the storeroom were sealed and simultaneously the air evacuated via the vents.

Knowing what was happening but with no way to stop it, and in his panic not even registering Mara's mask, the guard hammered urgently at the door, first in the hope of attracting attention and then in an irrational effort to break it open. As he was distracted, Mara picked up a heavy can and slammed it against the side of his head, knocking him unconscious. She picked up his gun from the floor, very glad to be armed once again.

 _"Put on the bracelet..."_ said the voice, apparently irritated at having to involve himself in this.

"What b?"- Suddenly the object was there on the floor next to her - There was no disturbance in the air or charge of static as with Revenant's teleport, but the arrival was marked by a momentary halo of light around the object that seemed to melt away within a couple of seconds but remained as a faint after image on her retinas.

 _"Put it on...!"_ For some reason, she found herself obeying, crouching down and putting the bracelet, superficially like a refined version of Revenant's, on her wrist - It fastened with a click.

_Teleport engaged..._

* * *

The atmosphere on the bridge of Leviathan could not possibly have been more tense, not even if the intruder had started firing on them. The Admiral hunched over the scanner scope, hungry for the latest data quicker than the bridge personnel could provide it.

"Have we got it yet...?" he demanded. "Get me precise data on that thing... And an optical. Now!"

"Trying, sir..." said the First Lieutenant. "It seems to resist attempts to scan it... _somehow_..."

"Well, get me a _visual_!"

"That we can do, sir..." came the relieved reply, and he urgently pointed to the Admiral's scope. One of the operators hurriedly put the visual feed through.

"It's..." One of the operators looking through the scopes, a grizzled veteran, breathed out slowly. "It _can't_ be... Never thought I'd see..."

"Get me the visual!" the Admiral demanded as there was a brief lag before the image appeared on his scope. "Put it on screen as well!" He looked up.

"It's back..." said the veteran, smiling faintly, tears even forming in his eyes. _"It's back..."_

* * *

Mara found herself clutching at the bracelet on her wrist as the only real thing, at least the only real thing that wasn't _her_ or the clothes on her back, that she could see - Everything else was in flux.

The space around her was somehow... fluid. Not as in made of a liquid, but somehow... imprecise, as if the very space she was standing in - and in itself that was a puzzle as there didn't seem to be a floor of any sort - was in the process of forming. Deciding at great length, in no hurry at all, about what kind of wall or floor or ceiling to become, with all options on the table. It was extraordinarily disorienting, and not at all an experience she would have chosen to have.

_Table._

A large table started to form a short distance from her as she thought that, and Mara resolved to restrain her thoughts while this process was taking place.

She did not dare look down - insanity threatened if she did that. Better to just close her eyes and wait. No doubt it would be over soon. Then... Whatever else might come.

_Internal configuration continuing at reduced capacity... Processing... Life support maintained... Processing..._

* * *

The Admiral's eyes widened.

The other ship glided above the surface of the planetoid toward Leviathan with an elegance the UniS ship could not aspire to. Its hull grey but shining brilliantly with the reflected light of TNCB-5213, it was formed of four parallel, vaguely cigar-shaped pieces, three of them arranged in a triangular formation around the central one, all ending with forward-pointing turrets terminating in narrow prongs. At the rear, cradled and partially-enclosed by the structure of the ship, a bright-green spheroid - Perhaps the ship's means of propulsion, or perhaps fulfilling another function that could only be guessed at.

To the eyes of Leviathan's bridge personnel, it was simultaneously beautiful, awe-inspiring, utterly alien and terrifying - A lot of the operators stepped back from their stations nervously as if the alien could come out of the scopes to attack them.

The Admiral looked around incredulously. "What is it?" he demanded. The veteran looked over at him, seemingly incredulous that the Admiral could possibly not _know._

_"It's the Liberator."_


	11. Chapter 11

**(Relevant extract follows from the annals of the August Siblinghood of Morphenniel; Data adjunct 486 - Experiments in Lawlessness: The Late Federation and the Frontier Planets)**

****...** **

...When writing these briefings, it is still even now possible to be struck with sheer incredulity at social policies once genuinely advanced as if not exactly beneficial then at least expedient - The Federation's interference in the affairs of the Old Earth agricultural colony of Gauda Prime stretches credulity more than most.

It should not be necessary to explain the result of the complete suspension of the rule of law in any isolated community - particularly not one with inhabitants long inured to toil, not to fighting - or the kind of people likely to descend on such a place in great numbers - from all across the galaxy. Suffice it to say that the proud colonists who had rejected the Federation's initial offers of protection were soon begging to be admitted.

Neither should it be a surprise that the Federation's acceptance of the beleaguered colonists' joining should be the immediate, if monumentally costly and time-consuming, restoration of law and order on Gauda Prime. Some people, as an ancient saying tells us, just have no shame.

[See data adjunct 482B - _Scarred for Life: Roj Blake and the Final Throw of the Dice_ \- for further details of this period.]

**********...** ** ** ** **

****(Extract concluded. Exiting backdoor... Deleting data retrieval signets... Deleted)** **

* * *

**Gauda Prime - 27 years ago**

A voice crackled from a communicator - _"Alive...!_ _I want him alive!"_

* * *

Arlen walked slowly along the line of bodies arranged on the ground for her inspection, trying to ignore the still-pounding headache. _"Tarrant..."_ she said as the youthful face was revealed, serene in death - "Dayna Mellanby... Vila Restal..." Her hand went up to to absently with the bandage wrapped around her head where it had impacted on the ground after Vila's uncharacteristic and ultimately-doomed heroics - "Blake... Soolin... Deva..."

She looked up - "Why this one...?"

"Who... _Klyn_...?" The man accompanying her was wiry with a thinning shock of curly hair, his face deeply-lined with a prominent beak of a nose, clad in the same kind of Federation field combat uniform Arlen had hurriedly donned before returning to the control room - His had no rank insignia, but nor did he need any.

Everyone who needed to know who Jarriere was _did_ \- For others, there was no need.

"She's irrelevant... Commissioner Sleer is only interested in the seven. You can dispose of Klyn _and_ Deva here."

"If you say so..." Jarriere cocked his head. "The seven...?"

"That's what they're called, aren't they...?"

"Are they...? Not by anyone I know..." Despite his words, Jarriere's voice and demeanor were the very opposite of combative - gentle and unassuming would be more apt. Curious considering his reputation.

"Perhaps you should travel more widely and talk to a larger circle of people..." Arlen suggested icily.

"Ah, you've been listening to the _stories_..." Jarriere passed a glance over the row of dead faces - "Out of history and into legend, eh...?" He looked up at her again. "Blake's _Seven_." He grinned. "Depending, of course, on how you count them."

"Just do it."

"Certainly... And after that, I'll be off... Me and a few others."

"What...?"

"This is the end of something, I think..." Jarriere mused. "And the beginning of something else." He looked steadily at her, hand not far from his gun. "Time to get out..."

"Hasn't she always rewarded you well...? I've never seen anyone else she's held in the same esteem..."

"I'd go further than that" said Jarriere. "I'd say she's always been absolutely _lovely_ to me, and that makes me all the more set on getting out while the going's good."

"And you just expect me to let you go...? Let you disobey a direct order...?" Arlen's question was calm, as though she was merely discussing a hypothetical scenario.

"Yes" he replied without hesitation, his voice now somewhat flinty. "Because if you don't, your chances of getting out of here are substantially reduced... Your chances of getting out of here with _him_ non-existent. And do you really want to be the one who failed to get him back to _her_...?"

Arlen's eyes narrowed as she mulled it over, aware of the itchy trigger-fingers no doubt poised all around her - Her men _and_ Jarriere's...

"Think on it..." he continued persuasively - "When you bring her those bodies... and him _alive_... She won't care about anything else... _Anyway_ , she knows if she ever really needs me again, I'll be there... For the right price. It's just a slight adjustment in our relationship, that's all..."

"I'm not agreeing..." she said at last.

"Of course not... You're just recognising reality." His voice was gentle once more, and Jarriere grinned again. "It was good working with you... Hope to again before it's all over."

"And if she does hunt you...?"

"Unlikely" he said. "I'm the one who does her hunting, and it'll take a while to find anyone else as good as me... Anyway, I think she might see it much as I do... You could come too, you know... Send him back with the others, come and make some real money, and a proper life for yourself."

"The service is my life."

Jarriere seemed to be disappointed at that, even a little sad - In time, Arlen came to believe that he had probably been able to foresee a few things that she couldn't. "Well..." he said, holding out his hand - Arlen reluctantly and briefly shook it -"Good luck to you, lieutenant... Hope it all works out well for you."

* * *

**Gauda Prime - 3 months ago**

Most of the habitable land mass of the planet Gauda Prime was taken up by native forest or the vast plantations of the colonists, but here and there, on rocky outcrops, small settlements had sprung up where the farmers could trade and obtain essential supplies. Some of them grew from there by means of limited deforestation into the primeval forests. Well into the Fourth Century of the Second Calendar, such cities were inevitably hives of criminality and violence and indeed, even decades after the nominal restoration of the rule of law, remained the province of the organised criminal.

Some of those criminals were rich enough to be able to buy themselves out of even being regarded as criminals.

* * *

_"There now..."_

Mara sat very still as the small hand-held device buzzed across her skull, emitting sonic waves that very efficiently, smoothly and cleanly trimmed her thick brown hair - Again she glanced down as if expecting to see the discarded chestnut locks falling onto her lap or the floor around the chair, but somehow the device seemed able to discard the unwanted strands into thin air.

The old man peered closely at the top of her head and ran his fingers across her now close-cropped hair. "You like that...?" he asked.

"I haven't seen it" she said, and held on to the arms as he suddenly spun her around one hundred and eighty degrees to view herself in the nearby full-length mirror - Mara actually did like the short cut suggested by the hairdresser - She could see him too in the mirror, his long beak of a nose jutting forward as he awaited her verdict with the confidence of a man who knew just how good he was.

"That cut has always been my favorite..." he said. "Not _all_ women suit it, but those who _do_..."

She reached up to toy with the unruly locks of slightly curly hair he had left intact at the front. "You missed a bit."

He chuckled. "Quite deliberate, I assure you..." he said in his soft, distinctively-accented tones. "Both for aesthetic reasons - don't ask me why, I just know it's _right_... And to hide that cranial port of yours... _Oh_ , years since I saw anything like that... Just where have you come from...?"

"A planet."

"Good for you. Good for you. I asked for that."

She climbed down a little even if she didn't for a moment relax her guard. "Sorry... But I've learned not to tell anyone my business."

"As I say, quite right... Quite right... Save it for Mister Rollo when he arrives, eh...?"

She stood and followed him as he walked over and cleansed his hands at a larger table-mounted sonic cleaner. "How much longer till he gets back...?"

"Oh, not long, not long..." He used the angled mirror to have a look at her without her being aware of his scrutiny. "Are you not having an agreeable time here, then...?"

She eyed the dingy surroundings of the shop - its ancient fittings and wooden shutters hanging open onto the dusty street - and smiled. "Not at all... I do actually quite like this place."

"Have a mind to stay here, do you...?"

"No, I don't think so. As soon as I find out what I need to know, I'll be off."

"So it's information you're looking for...?"

"You're very good."

"Thank you..." he replied.

"But not that good, eh...?"

"Well, that would depend..." he said "On what my agenda was... If I was seeking to genuinely cause you to betray your intentions with an unguarded remark, then I was clearly wasting my time... But if I was rather seeking to distract you while the tiny device I planted in your scalp attunes to your brainwave patterns and prepares to download all the data I'm likely to need, while simultaneously - _and unfortunately_ \- causing a fatal hemorrhage in the process..." - His gentle tones became gradually sharper as he went on - "Then perhaps I am, as you say, _that_ good."

Mara tried to ignore the chill advancing up her spine, and focus. "You're not really a hairdresser, are you...?"

"I am absolutely a hairdresser. I've done many other things too." As an aside, he remarked "It really is amazing the kind of things you can pick up quite cheap on the black market here - Like that little device - I would have killed for that in the old days..."

"Am I speaking to Rollo...?"

"That's how some know me... You, as a very special courtesy extended to very few, may know me as Jarriere."

"Your real name?"

" _One_ of my real names."

"I was told you could help me find a former Federation officer called Arlen."

"Arlen what?"

"Just Arlen... That's the only name I was given." This custom among the older people in the wider galaxy for primary and secondary names still confused her a little.

"Given by whom...?"

"Does it matter?"

He smiled. "Suppose not. That wasn't so difficult, was it...? Why do you want her?"

"You know where she can be found?"

"I didn't say that now, did I...? Let's not get ahead of ourselves."

"All right."

"If you had simply asked that in the first place we might have reached an accommodation of some kind much sooner."

"Is that what we're going to do?"

"I'm not sure... What do you think...?"

"I think we might."

"You're very sure of yourself, aren't you...?"

"No..." Mara replied. "I just don't have much to lose."

"Oh... So you think it's only those with something to lose who fear anything...?"

She pondered that. "I don't know..."

"What do you know...? And, while you're answering that, chuck this one on too - Who sent you...?"

"You wouldn't know him."

"What's your name...?"

"Ooh, that one is far more difficult than you imagine..."

"Go for whatever feels most like you at the time, that's what I say..."

"Good advice. But, before I tell you that, can I ask you something...?"

He smiled at her boldness. "I can't promise to answer, but go ahead."

"That display over there on your desk... Is that connected to this thing on my head...?"

"Yes."

"Thank you..." Mara closed her eyes. "You'd best just go ahead, then."

Jarriere frowned, as if suspecting some kind of trap, then just for a moment he looked angry. He had finally lost patience with this girl - "You're forcing me to use it... I hope you realise that."

"I do."

The device he had used to cut her hair was in Jarriere's hand a second later, as he used it to activate the lethal brainwave converter - His eyes widened and he shrieked in agony, his body spasming and causing him not just to drop the control but to collapse onto the floor. Mara was standing over him in an instant.

"You really think I didn't see you planting that thing...?" she said, scooping up the control - Carefully she removed the tiny device from where she had in turn planted it at the base of his spine and slapped it onto the bald spot at the back of his head. Jarriere howled with renewed pain, and he tried to form words. Mara put her face very close to his.

"I've never killed anyone before" she told him. "And I didn't ever want to... I'm sorry."

 _"What..."_ he gasped. _"Your name...?"_

She looked him in the eye, glancing momentarily at the controller to familiarise herself with it - "It downloads automatically, I assume...?"

_"Name...?"_

"My name..." She thought for a moment. "My name is Blake."

Jarriere's eyes clouded over. "Then I'm... I'm glad it was you..." Mara found herself confused and a little disturbed by that, and she moved back from him a little.

She held up the control, and activated the second stage of the process - Extraction. Jarriere's eyes turned black instantaneously, and without another sound he slumped over onto the floor. Mara turned and tried to forget the twitching corpse was even there as she moved over to the desk, ready for the next stage of her mission.

 _"Now..."_ she mused. _"Where are you, Arlen...?"_

* * *

****DSV-A1 -** Now**

_"Murder...?"_ the voice asked, and Mara found herself looking around involuntarily, searching for the source, failing in that but succeeding in making herself nauseous in the process. She made herself ignore it and close her eyes against the assault on her sanity that was the surrounding space.

 _"Murder...?"_ it said again. _"Was it really necessary...?"_ This time she recognised it. _  
_

"Hello, Alek..." she said. "Another data ghost...?"

 _"Murder...?"_ he reproved again. _"Is that what I taught you...?"_ Mara's temper flared.

"No... Not a data ghost... And not Alek either... You know what I think...? I think that whatever this place is, whoever is in charge is attempting to use very basic - stupidly basic - psychological means to break me down and make me somehow easier to dominate, easier to fit to whatever purpose is intended... Well, forget it... You blew it the moment you tried to use _him_ against me... Because _that_ man..." - Her voice broke a little, and she took a moment to regroup - "The _thought_ of that man, that's what gives me strength...! Not weakness...! _Strength_...!"

The unfathomable multi-dimensional chaos surrounding her gave Mara no single focus for her ire, but she stared at a fixed point defiantly nonetheless. "So here's what you can do... Bring more! Bring everything you've got...!" She took a deep breath and yelled _"Bring it!"_

* * *

**A planet in one of the outer spiral arms of the galaxy**

Avon's current pair of boots had deteriorated beyond the ability to wade through the fording point of the river, a mere trickle though it now was, so he took them off and rolled up the legs of his trousers. On the other side, he let his feet dry in the air as he took his usual halfway rest, looking round the whole time - A lifetime's caution was not to be abandoned at this stage.

The small hand-held device was in his hand almost as soon as the buzz was heard, and he snapped "What is it, Orac...?"

 _"You did ask to be informed..."_ the petulant voice retorted, sounding almost wounded. _"The ship has arrived at Galaxy City and is currently engaged in selecting its crew..."_

"Good." Avon took a breath - This course of action had been so long in the planning - contacting the abandoned System rebel station, fooling the automatic systems, ordering construction of a new Deep Space Vehicle and waiting the years it took to be assembled and finally traverse the entire galaxy. Now it was at last here - The final act - Or perhaps the first.

 _"Is that all...?"_ Orac demanded fussily, no doubt eager to get back to numerous matters demanding his direct attention. Avon made him wait a little longer.

"Will you miss me, Orac...?" he said, a faint smile threatening to break out. "When the time comes..."

_"I do not understand the question... Kindly rephrase it or withdraw it entirely..."_

"Never mind."

* * *

Laden with the bag of provisions he had obtained in his trip to the scavengers' encampment, Avon went back along the ancient path lined with sparse shrubs, then around the perimeter of the dome, and soon he came to the entrance he customarily used to gain access to the massive structure that had now been his home for quite some time.

The electronic key, without which access would be unlikely and _safe_ access utterly impossible, whirred away for about a minute, and he waited patiently. Finally, the lock yielded and the round access hatch was able to open, and Avon made sure to secure it again when he was inside.

Up the rickety set of stairs, and along the service gantry, and then through the door into one of the main corridors. His footsteps echoed in the silent emptiness of the place. Eventually, he came to the sealed entrance to the lab block and used his keyed entry coder to gain access.

The door slid open fast, and if Avon was startled to see his companion waiting immediately on the other side, he did not flinch or otherwise give any sign of it. "I've brought the supplies" he said casually.

"Good..." The tall, heavy-set man turned away and walked across the lab to continue monitoring the instruments.

"You should be able to make more of your enzyme now" Avon added.

 _"Thank you..."_ The other man was apparently engrossed, one eye engaged in peering through a scope. The other eye, the one currently visible to Avon, was bisected by an old scar that made his eyelid droop. From this angle, a thick mop of curly grey hair obscured his other features. "I do so _hate_ indigestion."

"You've been visiting the scavengers again" said Avon. It was a statement, not a question, and his tone did not invest it with any apparent judgment.

"I have. You don't mind, I trust...?"

"I didn't say so." Avon took off his coat and draped it over a chair. " _Interesting_ that you only do this while I am _asleep_ \- Almost like you don't want me to find out... You were... dressed like that...?"

Straightening up, the other man's face broke out into a broad grin, and he looked down at his apparel - Fairly normal, he thought - Much the same rough homespun sort of ensemble that Avon himself sported.

But they both knew he was being disingenuous. " _Always_ like that?" Avon demanded.

"Well... I might have experimented..."

"Just be careful."

"Oh, I'm always careful, Avon... Is it me you're worried about, or am I stepping on your toes somewhat...? You can tell me if I am, don't worry... I wouldn't want to be... opening up any old wounds for you."

"If you do, believe me, I'll let you know."

"As I say... Don't hold anything back..." said Roj Blake. "We are, after all, _old friends_ , you and I."


	12. Chapter 12

**The final day of the Second Intergalactic War**

Cast in the blood-red glow of a dying star, the last Andromedan fleet waited. The bulk of their other forces had been destroyed in their recent, sudden and unexpected, reversal, but there was still enough firepower here to destroy the exhausted forces of the humans several times over.

All they awaited was the final decision - and the orders that would follow. One thing remained.

An intelligence asset was about to be exploited.

* * *

\- Transfer of prisoner is proceeding -

\- And what is so special about this prisoner? - Our policy toward the intelligent - semi-intelligent - primates of this galaxy is extermination - Need I really remind you of that? -

\- No - Yet I am not the one who spent all that time among them, am I? -

\- Standard infiltration procedure an- -

\- -And your speech patterns? - More and more _human_ all the time - My orders, since you seem intent, come from the highest authority - The _highest_ \- The prisoner - The Avon Kerr - is to be investigated -

\- Questioned? -

\- He has already been questioned - Exhaustively - And provided little of use - The Avon Kerr is unusually resistant to our techniques -

\- So there is only one recourse -

\- He is to go to the Inquisitor-general - There we will discover just what is so different about this _Avon Kerr_ -

* * *

He was borne from one ship of the Andromedan fleet to another encased in a large translucent slab of some peculiar organic material, driven by some kind of anti-gravity device. Despite himself, Avon found it fascinating - but then he had found practically everything he had observed since his capture fascinating. Somewhere, at the back of his mind, it occurred to him that he should be feeling some kind of trepidation at what awaited him, but that just made him feel faintly amused.

Something would happen - It usually did, and if it didn't...? Well, what did it matter?

They rose on some kind of open lift through hundreds of decks on the vast semi-organic Andromedan ship, and when they finally halted at their destination he felt not even the slightest jolt - Either his gelatinous prison protected him or the mechanics of the lift did. He looked to either side, where his escorts stood. The standard Andromedan infantry soldiers seemed to be a different caste to the officers and scientists - crude humanoid shapes made from the same semi-transparent gelatinous substance as his prison. He wondered if they were stuck in that shape, or had the same ability to shape-shift and mimic others as the Andromedan agents he had encountered on Star One. He could contentedly spent years studying these creatures if it hadn't been so urgently necessary to find ways to destroy them instead.

 _"Leave us..."_ said a disembodied voice, whispering yet totally clear, the sound apparently originating from everywhere at once. The soldiers obeyed, and Avon tried to see beyond the pool of light he had been placed in, to no avail. Then the slab encasing him started to change its state, the material running and forming channels and rivulets, thinning at the front until a gap opened and expanded, soon becoming wide enough to step through.

So he did.

 _"Welcome, Avon..."_ the voice said, and he looked around for a source. Obligingly another light came on, illuminating a large podium and some sort of intricate technological cradle for one of the Andromedans - One of the officer caste like those which had infiltrated Star One all those years ago, but far larger. This amorphous green creature glistening in its cradle was roughly the same size and weight as a man, with numerous spindly tendrils extending out from the central mass and connecting to, he assumed, the ships systems and various means of communication - Not for the first time, Avon wished for a chance to study the Andromedans' electro-chemical data storage technology closely.

"What do you want?" Avon's question was abrupt and toneless, very much giving the impression he resented the interruption to his schedule. "I was busy."

 _"Ah... Yes..."_ The creature had no mouth, and Avon assumed the voice was being generated somehow, perhaps directly from its brainwaves. What was-?

- _"I am the... Inquisitor-general..."_ the creature obligingly told him, and despite himself Avon took a breath. He had heard of this particular Andromedan, but never expected to face it in person. _"You are to be congratulated..."_ it continued. _"The defeat you inflicted on my brethren was impressive..."_

"Which one?" Avon turned away from it to peer into the surrounding darkness, boots squeaking on the smooth floor.

_"We will discover much, I think, you and I... That, you see, is my function... Oh, you thought perhaps I am expert in torture or some such tedious practice... But no, I am much more than that... I am Inquisitor, in the purest sense..."  
_

Interesting... What did that mean, exactly...?

_"Oh, make no mistake, my brethren expect me to extract information from you, more or less as you might assume. But I have less interest in the deployment of what is left of your military forces than I have in what makes you - you, specifically - the one who has brought us closer to defeat than ever before in our long history... What is Avon Kerr, and if humans produce such a man, capable of defeating us, is it really best that they become extinct...? Would it not be more diverting to see... What is the next stage of their development...?"_

"That's a lot of questions" Avon observed wryly.

_"Oh, indeed... I am well-named, you can see... Now, time is short, and I must advance... I see your brainwave scan is almost complete... Oh, do not worry, that is far less... intrusive... than it may sound... It merely allows me to begin to form conclusions... No, not quite conclusions... but lines of inquiry..."_

"It occurs to me..." Avon mused "Your ideas concerning what to do with my race might not be the same as that of your colleagues. From what I've seen, they are quite clear in their purpose. And their purpose is to destroy."

_"Yes, you are quite correct... It is a conundrum..."_

"So the question, Inquisitor-general, becomes - What are _you_ going to _do_ about it?"

* * *

**A little less than 12 standard hours later...**

It began with one explosion, one only, but soon it became a chain-reaction, rippling through ship after ship of the last Andromedan fleet in existence. The fleet erupted into a cataclysmic expanse of fire and rended metal - The sudden and furious release of energy was silent in the vacuum of space, but anyone tuned to the Andromedans' internal communication systems would have heard the screams, or what passed for screams from a life form such as theirs - In their panic, many of the crews switched from one bizarre shape to another as if cycling through till they could find some form that could support them, however briefly, in the hostile environment of deep space.

One ship survived - A small one, and it was outside the area of the explosions before they erupted. As if its two occupants had somehow known what was going to happen.

* * *

**A planet in one of the outer spiral arms of the galaxy - 15 years later**

_"Attention..."_ said Orac suddenly - _"The central computer on DSV-A1 is requesting clarification."_

"Clarification on what...?" Avon did not even look up from his work. He was making minute adjustments to very fine circuitry, a magnifying lens over one eye.

_"Is it authorised to fire on hostiles...? I really am most surprised it is necessary to elaborate - You should have foreseen"-_

-"It may return fire if fired upon, _if_ and only _if_ UniS forces threaten the safety of the vessel or its passengers... Tell it _that_ , Orac!"

 _"Very well..."_ Orac said sniffily, and closed the comm link.

"Can I help?" - Blake stood behind Avon as he worked, casual with his thumbs hooked into his belt. He had listened with apparent amusement throughout the terse exchange.

"By staying out of my way, yes."

"It's like that, is it?" said Blake, amused. " _You know_ , it's very little fun being a ghost."

"You're not a ghost..."

"Well, that's a matter of perspective..."

"You must like that shape - You spend a lot of time in it."

"Does it bother you?"

"What if it did?"

"Feeling a little guilty, are we...?" Blake laughed. "I must say though, Avon, I was very glad to see that _of late_ you've started asking questions first..."

"Were you...?"

 _"And shooting later_..." Blake said pointedly, talking over the interruption.

"You must be very proud, _Blake_... After all this time, still inspiring the young and foolish to get themselves killed." Avon hadn't yet looked up, and had no plans to.

Blake thought about that for a moment, staring into space. "If it wasn't me, it would be something else. That drive to overcome tyranny is in all of us..." He looked now at Avon. "However deeply it might be submerged."

"How very inspiring."

Blake frowned. "And, since I'm not _really_ Blake, that particular pearl of wisdom can only have come from you, Avon." The frown was replaced by another smile. "Who'd have thought it?" he mused warmly.

Avon was amused by that, and after a few seconds grinned broadly, though he still didn't look up from his work. "Certainly not me."

"Feeling the responsibility?"

"Keenly."

"All those young lives, depending on you..." Crossing over to Avon's other side, Blake leaned in very close, almost speaking directly into his ear. "After all, we don't want them ending up like us, do we?" - Avon actually stopped working for a moment.

"No."

"Well, then..." Blake paused before continuing, speaking slowly and very precisely. "You'd better get it right this time, hadn't you?"

* * *

**DSV-A1**

Mara was starting to recover from the nausea induced by the craziness of her surroundings, as the chamber around her started to settle on its final form - She finally had a floor to stand on without feeling sick, walls to tell her which way was left or right, up or down - Ceiling? Not quite there yet. She dare not look up - She still hadn't quite recovered from the last time.

Yes, this was actually becoming a room worthy of the name. There was only one minor problem.

This room had no doors.

* * *

**Galaxy City**

Darvin, Rissa and Caul's headlong charge took their foes by surprise, but even so it was a near thing - Shots impacted all around them as they hurtled toward the guards. Predictably enough, Rissa was the first to come into contact, and wrenched the gun from the hand of her first opponent and somehow turned and fired before the man could even react, shooting him in the face.

"Oy!" Darvin called, after elbowing his own opponent in his face and breaking his nose. Also armed, he turned his gun on the others and was met by universal, abject, surrender - Raised hands all round. He and Rissa shared a quick smile, but neither of them had any illusions - this was only half a dozen of them compared to the hundred more out there. And who knew how many others were in on it.

Then there were the UniS troops accompanying Scarn's ambassador. Probably safe to say they weren't going to be friendlies.

He was about to speak when, without warning, Caul threw himself forward and slammed Rissa against the wall - Her momentary anger vanished when a sniper's shot impacted a few feet away, exactly where she had been. Darvin turned and shot the sniper as Rissa turned her captured gun on the others - Once Darvin's attention had turned back that way, she threw an approving glance Caul's way.

"Thanks." - He waved it away, gasping for breath.

* * *

"You were expecting someone else, no doubt..." Brintun glanced briefly around the Administrator's suite once again, clearly finding it no more to his liking than before.

"I was..." Servalan replied, appearing entirely unruffled by the presence not only of Brintun but of the several armed UniS soldiers accompanying him. "Someone a little more... invited, perhaps. What have you done with her...?"

Brintun ignored the question, and sat - He wiped the sweat from his forehead with a decorative throw before casting it aside. "Your head of security has staged a coup..." he said bluntly. "My men have managed to hold the hub and a small area surrounding it, but Ramm's people have superior numbers..."

She smiled. "So that's it."

"Yes."

"So... You step in to assist in my... difficulties and help regain control, and after the immediate crisis... You find it necessary to garrison Galaxy City with UniS troops..."

"I frankly hadn't thought quite that far ahead, but what a good idea..."

"Very well played."

He paused before venturing a reply. "Thank you. Coming from you, that's..." He looked down with mild surprise. "Planning a journey?"

On her feet, incongruous with the long dress, Servalan wore military-issue boots somewhat like his. "Well..." she said "You reach a certain age and comfort becomes more of a priority than it used to be."

He smiled along with her, though his was watery and somewhat reptilian. "You do realise, of course... You have no choice but to co-operate... You can even remain as Administrator..." That was said with apparent spontaneity, as though the thought had only just occurred to him - Fooling no one.

"In name only..."

"In name, yes... Under UniS protection... You will be the political leader, and a senior UniS man will be in charge of all military affairs... A small price, surely...?"

"How long do I have to think about it?"

"You will give us the code to disarm their hand-weapons remotely..." Brintun said, leaning forward. "Wouldn't you rather a bloodless revolution...? Think of the civilians..."

"You've thought of everything, haven't you...?" Servalan mused, and Brintun leaned back again complacently. " _Almost_ everything."

* * *

Rissa's answer to Darvin's unspoken question was quick and decisive. "Shoot them."

"It would solve a lot of problems" Darvin mused, as he handed one of their captured weapons to Caul. "You know how to use this...?" he asked.

"Give him a few seconds" Rissa said confidently with a faint smile.

"I'm asking him" Darvin said, turning back to Caul.

"Uh... Give me a few seconds..." Caul said.

 _"You don't have a few seconds..."_ said a voice, and they all searched frantically for its source - Darvin looked down, and faintly through the grate running along the side of the floor, he saw a familiar face looking up from the level beneath them.

"Ramm!" He tried to get a clear shot downward even as the cackling former head of security disappeared from view, just as several more of his men appeared at either end of the walkway.

"Surrender!" one of them called.

They all had a clear shot. A headlong charge would get them all killed. Darvin racked his brains, even as he automatically held out his arm to stop Rissa attempting it anyway. As the guards approached, his options were narrowed proportionately as the range was - They could not possibly miss.

This time, they really were trapped.

* * *

"Laser probe..." Avon muttered, and was about to stand to go and retrieve the necessary tool when he saw it on the worktop right next to him. How...?

"Interesting..." he said. "I find myself wondering how that probe came to be there. Given that I would have _noticed_ if anyone _else_ had moved it..."

"If I told you how the trick was done, it wouldn't be a trick any more, would it...?" said the wiry man with receding grey hair as he moved behind him to hop up nimbly and sit on a nearby bench. "Well _well_ , Avon. You've gotten old..."

"And if I told you how _that_ trick was done..." Avon mused "It would be something of a long story." He turned briefly. "Hello, Vila."

Vila was admiring his reflection in one of the metal service panels on the wall. " _Hhhmmm_... I've aged quite well..."

Avon was mildly impatient. "You _mean_ my imagined _version_ of you..."

"Well, the real me never got the chance, did he...?" Vila stared wistfully into the distance. "And he had so much promise..."

"I'm sorry."

That was a straightforward statement from Avon, free of any obvious emotional resonance, but it still raised Vila's eyebrows. "...And I wish I could have stuck around long enough to hear that" he said sadly.

"So do I." Avon rubbed his hands over his face, exhaustion catching up with him. "This is a foolish self-indulgence..." he said. "I have to say goodbye. There isn't much time, and this is going to be _too_ _close_ for any mistakes..." When several seconds passed and there was no reply, he turned. "Vila...?"

Vila was no longer perched on the bench, but in his place was a tall woman of slender build, dark shoulder-length hair turning grey - She had a long face and dark eyes that seemed to see through all of Avon's defences into what remained of his soul.

 _You're right, Avon..._ said Cally, telepathically projecting her voice into his mind - _There isn't much time left... And you don't like it when anything gets too close, do you?_

Avon considered that for a moment, and then turned back to his work. "Hello, Cally."

"Regrets, Avon...?" This time she spoke aloud.

He turned again to look at her for a few seconds before replying. "Only small ones."

"I'm glad."

"No you're not. I let you down." Cally didn't reply, but something in her expression seemed to concede the point. "And it was all for nothing" Avon continued.

"Is that what you believe...?"

"This time..." he mused, "This time we're going to get it _right_."

* * *

Juni glanced over at Faal silently. They sat on opposite sides of the shuttle's passenger section, both flanked by armed UniS troops. The gaunt Clone Master was intermittently visible as the light through the viewing ports played over his face - lights from the asteroid mining stations and orbit beacons on their way through the belt surrounding the planetoid hosting Galaxy City. She badly wanted to reach out, but the presence of the UniS troops thoroughly inhibited her.

For his part, Faal gave no sign of being worried, or of being anything more than slightly inconvenienced. If he was as scared as she was at what might await them on the UniS flagship, he hid it well.

* * *

_"They are on their way..."_ Brintun's voice crackled through the speaker above Admiral Zanso, causing the veteran officer to frown impatiently. _"Nothing must prevent you getting these prisoners to Proxima, Admiral... That is of paramount importance..."_

"I advised you not to send them as yet..." Zanso barked. "We have a situation here..."

"The alien is moving away again, sir..." reported an officer, as if to reassure the Admiral.

"That means nothing...!" Zanso assured his subordinate. "It may be coming around for an attack run - Had you thought of that?!" He leaned over the transmitter again. "Brintun - Can you hear me...? Abort the shuttle run. I say again, abort. We may soon be under attack by an unidentified - _No_ , a _known_ hostile..."

 _"Too late, Admiral..."_ the voice crackled again. _"Make the best of it..."_ The sentiment in itself was encouraging, but from Brintun it sounded decidedly ominous.

* * *

DSV-A1's central computer sifted reports from its subordinated computers and all the ship's instruments, skimming through reams of data at miraculous speed - Thus it became clear that the situation was balanced on a knife edge. To complete its mission, decisive action may be necessary.

_Hostile vessels arming weapons... Force wall at maximum... Weapons systems on line... Confirmed..._

From one of its forward-facing prongs, DSV-A1 fired a blindingly intense burst of energy in the direction of the UniS flotilla.

* * *

The lights in the laboratory, driven by ancient programming, had dimmed slightly to simulate the night-time that wouldn't otherwise exist under the thick bomb-proof shell of the dome. Avon had gone off for a few hours sleep, aware that it might be his last such opportunity for a while - His companion, back in the shape of Roj Blake, was alone.

He laid out the equipment, and poured the chemical compound, which had taken on a greenish-brown colour, into a large flat dish so that it was no more than a few millimetres deep - Breathing deeply, he laid his hand flat in the compound so that it was partially submerged, and after a few seconds started to absorb it through his skin. As his concentration slipped, his body started to pulse with internal light and his shape became less distinct, but as the compound was drained he resumed his grip on Roj Blake's shape.

The Inquisitor-general stepped back, restored.


	13. Chapter 13

_"So why did you do it...?"_

Finding himself interrupted again, Avon turned to his companion - _Blake_ , he had called him, whether out of a desire to mock, or simply because it felt right, he wasn't sure - Perhaps if he took a few moments to engage with him he would be left alone to complete his work. Time was pressing, after all.

"What?"

The Inquisitor-general wore the form of Roj Blake again - It seemed to be more and more at home in it. At first Avon had found its mimicking of his old colleague disconcerting - in fact, he still did - but increasingly he found it more and more natural to see Blake as its native form. _After all..._ No one else was using it any more.

"Why did you kill him...? Every time I ask, you avoid the question... I'm starting to think you _might_ not even know."

"Why did _you_ kill your own species?" Avon countered.

"I suppose... because it had outlived its usefulness... Because... I couldn't allow them to complete the destruction of _yours_... Because I needed answers that their existence prevented me pursuing... Because they _deserved_ it, frankly." The Blake simulacrum did not blink. "Not something _you_ would have done?"

It was dark outside the dome, and thus artificial night-time inside, but Avon had risen very early from his snatched few hours of sleep, for one last shift. One last one, before... Whatever might follow. He would do his best, certainly, when he had to. Whether that would be enough was another matter.

"Did you get your answers?"

"Most of them" said Blake. "One remains particularly elusive." He paused for a few moments before asking again. "Why did you kill him?"

"Sometimes you can overthink things..." Avon mused. "Sometimes you spend so long wrestling with a question that the more thought you apply, the further away the answer seems to get..." He met Blake's gaze unflinchingly. "And sometimes the answer is so simple it can only ever come as a disappointment."

"He betrayed you... Or, at least, you thought he did."

"Briefly... There was a lot to take in."

"So you're saying it was an accident..."

"Or a mistake."

"Which is it?"

"Can't it be both?"

"Only if you want to leave the matter deliberately vague... What are you trying to avoid telling me, Avon...?"

"Who says I'm trying to avoid anything?"

"I do."

Avon's lip curled on one side, the only sign of his amusement. "And you should know..."

 _"Quite"_ Blake conceded, head turning to one side.

"Well..." Avon considered "I think I now understand why you wear that shape so much."

"And why is that?" _Blake_ moved over to a nearby chair and sat, the habit of grunting with the hypothetical strain on his old man's joints by now thoroughly ingrained.

"You think it's the only way you'll ever get the answer to that one final question..." Avon replied. "You think _guilt_ will make me answer it."

"What makes you think it's final...?" Blake pondered. "And also, what would _you_ know about guilt...?" A faint smile played around his features.

"You'd be surprised." That was not the expected answer, and Blake's expression changed as he sensed a change in the tone of their conversation.

"Try me."

"I have work to do."

"And you'll do it" said Blake, refusing to be sidetracked. "But first... Tell me."

"You seem to think we have ample time."

"Not ample, no... But we have enough."

"Blind faith...?"

"Or maybe I just know something you don't, Avon."

"And that is?"

"That some things are just meant to be. And _some_ things aren't meant to die. At least, not completely." He looked around the lab, seeing in his mind beyond its confines, imagining the labyrinthine complex of workplaces, meeting-places, forums, marketplaces... Law-courts... "You were here before, weren't you...? So was he."

"Why ask a question to which you already know the answer?" Avon paused. "That's not why _we_ came here, of course."

"No, I know. But it is nonetheless fitting. Isn't it...? _I_ think it is."

"A place for beginnings..." said Avon. "And, it follows, endings too."

"Or both together" suggested Blake in a subdued voice.

"I really do need to finish this" said Avon, indicating the dismantled equipment on the bench in front of him. Blake's head bobbed slightly as he snorted his amusement.

"One day..." he mused "You'll be the death of me... Again."

"Let's not let it come to that."

"Let's not."

The rest of the night passed quietly, and both of them knew the peace would not last. Events were moving, and actions on the other side of the galaxy were about to develop in ways that would bring danger to their door. This was one last, brief, respite, at the end of which they had to be ready. The calm before the storm that dawn would bring.

The storm _was_ coming.

* * *

If any birds had survived to fly in the skies above them, even such an enormous structure as the dome would have appeared tiny. At the altitudes some of the avian species that had once been native to these skies could have soared, the dome would have been a tiny detail in the bleak patchwork landscape spread out below them. They could have traversed the distance across the wastelands - the distance Avon on his supply-runs took more than a day to cover - in minutes, and inspected the ever-growing encampments of the scavengers in mere seconds.

The ones capable of climbing higher than that could have seen far more - The vast wilderness, the slowly recovering forests emerging from the slagheaps of an ancient industrial society - The scattered remnants of huge cities, long abandoned... The curve of the planet itself.

Higher than that was beyond the province of the birds that had once existed - None of them could have climbed above the abundance of oxygen into the thinner layers of atmosphere bordering on space itself, or seen the blue-green world in all its glory. None had evolved that capability. To do that, it had taken a far more advanced species sprung from similarly humble beginnings on the surface below. A species that had outgrown this place and discarded it long ago. The handful left clinging to it had been hurriedly evacuated - Not long ago in the vast scheme of things.

The dominant species on this world had flown away and become citizens of the galaxy, but this world from which they had sprung was not forgotten. Not completely. Some had returned, in small numbers, and more were coming.

To Earth.


	14. Chapter 14

The first shot of the war.

A burst of neutronic energy along an amplified carrier wave was streamed from the tip of one of DSV-A1's forward-facing prongs toward the Unified Systems flotilla at the speed of light. Momentarily blinding and too fast for the human eye to follow, it took something less than a second to reach its target.

An eternity.

The burst took so long to reach its target that the ship's central computer had leisure to adjust its trajectory slightly, in anticipation of the urgent course alterations to come. It had time to check on the progress of the internal architectural configuration now taking place within the vessel, albeit now on low power mode. It had time to confer with its subordinate battle, damage control and life systems computers to make sure all of them were operating at maximum efficiency.

All this time the burst crawled toward its target at 299,792,458 metres per second - as expressed by the humans' own models of measurement - with infinitesimally minor fluctuations actuated by the gravitational influence of the nearby planetoid and its surrounding asteroids. The first shot of the war. The new war.

More than half an eternity had still to elapse, so as an afterthought the ship's central computer checked on the condition of its single passenger.

* * *

This room had no doors. Yet.

Mara's fleeting moment of panic subsided as the qualifying _yet_ came to mind, and she forced herself to remain calm and let the environment continue to form around her. For the first time it occurred to her to wonder what she was breathing, and she consciously drew in some air. Fresh, clear of contaminants, free even of the staleness of the filtered air in the Habitat on Pelios. Naturally it was free of the airborne contaminants of the jungle. Sterile, cool, high in oxygen. Invigorating.

If they wanted her dead, she would be. That was clear enough. She could have been teleported whole into space, or had her atoms scattered across the void. She had a future, however short. And that was all she needed for now.

Then it happened. Something, some system of this environment, kicked in. Triggered by her presence, or triggered accidentally...? Unclear, but triggered it was. Time itself seemed to slow, and lights appeared on the periphery of her vision, making her lose what remained of her bearings. In time the lights came into view, floating just ahead of her but remaining tantalisingly out of reach - She should know, she tried very hard to reach them, but they remained reticent to let her.

For now.

* * *

**Pelios - Years earlier...**

"I need to talk to you" said Alek.

The girl waited for him to continue, unblinking. Offputtingly so, and he often wondered if she knew just how unsettling that ability was. "Go on" she replied.

 _No, Mara, you know_ , he decided. _You know. Of course you know..._ "I need to talk to you." _  
_

"You said that."

"They wanted me to talk to you."

"You're talking to me."

"Yes..."

"We talk all the time."

"Indeed..." he said, distracted. "And that's the problem."

"Problem...?"

"They think I've been spending too much time... They think I allocate more time than I should to your education..."

"I don't see that as a problem."

"Nor do I."

"But they do."

"Yes."

"When you say they... You mean _her_."

" _She_ and _they_ usually agree. You might as well view them as the same thing. It saves time."

"Good advice..." she said. "Thanks."

"What else am I here for...?" The question hung there.

"So... they want you to spend less time with me..."

"In a way... Actually, they want me to spend... Well, _no_ time with you."

"I see."

"Do you?"

"It had to happen eventually..." From that point, she avoided meeting his eye directly. "That's the rules. I mean, no one else has had this kind of tutorial supervision, have they...?"

"You were special."

"How?"

"What's that...?"

"How am I special?"

"A question for another time."

"What other time will there be?" She looked directly at him again, eyes glistening slightly, and now he found _he_ couldn't look at _her_.

* * *

"Yes, I remember..." she told the lights. "I remember... Of course I do... What's this meant to achieve... Eh...? Am I supposed to be all vulnerable now...? Now you've discovered my weakness...? Wrong!"

The lights moved closer, so close she could finally touch them. So, in her certainty that she wasn't supposed to, she did.

* * *

**Pelios - Never**

"YOU REALLY THINK YOU CAN FOLLOW HIM?" the faintly-distorted voice inquired of her in its clinical tones. _No, not here..._ Why was she back here...? The tiny enclosed, gleaming-white space furnished with nothing but a bench... _Why here...?_

"Follow who...?" she demanded.

"YOU REALLY THINK YOU CAN BE HIM?"

"Be who...?" Mara peered at the warped reflections in the highly polished featureless walls - Her. She was the only one here. No... Who was that standing behind her...? Looking over her shoulder...? Always there...

She turned, quickly, and spun around again to face the wall once more. No one there - she was alone, but...

There he was, again. The tall man, looming over her expectantly. She couldn't see his face, but she could make out the broad frame and his mane of curly hair... What did he want...? What did he expect...?

"I don't expect anything...!" she screamed at the disembodied voice. "I don't want to be... anything...!"

"THEY WAIT" it said. "THEY WAIT. AND THEY DREAM."

"What's that got to do with me...? And who are _they_...?"

"THEY ARE IMPRISONED. TORTURED. CHAINED. STARVED. WORKED TILL THEY BLEED. WORKED TILL THEY DIE. AND STILL THEY DREAM."

"Dream... Dream of what...?"

"YOU."

She peered once again at the reflection on the wall, and this time the tall man was not there. There was only her. Wearing his clothes - The loose shirt with puffy sleeves, the hard-wearing leather waistcoat, the sturdy belt around her waist with the gun attached on the end of a power cable. Even her hair, grown out once again like it used to be, allowed to form a wild crown of loose curls around her face.

_Mara..._

"I'm not a dream..." she said slowly. "I'm..."

_Mara..._

"Blake..." she said. "My name is Blake."

* * *

Having long since tried the patience of DSV-A1's central computer, the energy burst finally reached its destination. It streamed toward the UniS flotilla, overloading their scanners and blinding their scopes... and passed through the gap between the ships before impacting on its intended target.

The first shot of this war killed no one.

* * *

"Do I pass...?" Mara yelled. "Do I...?" She spun around. "Do I get a door now...? Even a small one...? I'm not that big, I could fit..." She stepped forward. "Ship...? Give me a door... Now!"

Then everything changed.


	15. Chapter 15

Mining Station Three had been founded in year 276 of the Second Calendar. Construction was completed just in time for the station to be abandoned with the first two in 279 - when the first Andromedan War caused the Federation to claw back resources from all non-essential operations, to devote to the fight for survival. Reactivated in 282, it served as a base for private operators to mine the lucrative asteroids of the TNCB-5213 system.

It was on Mining Station Three that a visionary mind, a mind belonging to a man whose name was swiftly forgotten when credit was seized by the better-connected, realised this was the perfect location for what eventually became Galaxy City.

All through the Federation's late period, and even through the years of crisis - as the people of the galaxy fought for their very existence against the Andromedans - construction continued, and Mining Station Three was a hub of activity - mining and processing, coordinating the vast effort involved in the construction of an artificial planetoid. Men, women and aliens alike toiled, laughed, cried - and died, at times, for the work was dangerous - and Station Three was mute witness to it all.

It was disintegrated instantly as DSV-A1's blast of energy hit it, along with the entire asteroid it was situated on. Fortunately, Station Three had been retired some time before, and no one was on the asteroid - Nonetheless, the fragments that spun away in all directions posed no little hazard to the UniS flotilla in close orbit of the planetoid, and made course correction a matter of urgency.

Of all the ships present, none were in quite so much danger as the tiny shuttle making its way from the surface to the UniS flagship.

* * *

Both Juni and Faal were securely strapped in to their flight-seats, so the tumultuous movement of the shuttle, though it may have left them severely disoriented, failed to do them any injury. The same could not be said for their guards. The flight from Galaxy City to the flagship was routine, and none of them had anticipated this kind of trouble, let alone finding themselves bombarded by space debris. The closest either of them came to getting hurt was when one of the guards slammed into the wall close to Juni with a sickening crunch, and slid down it slowly as inertia held him in place.

"We have to get out...!" she yelled to Faal. He rattled the locked clasp on the front of his straps in response. "There has to be a way!" she insisted, irritably pushing hair away from her face and struggling with her own clasp.

"Safer as we are...!" he cried.

"For how long...?!"

The shuttle was struck a glancing blow by another fragment of the destroyed asteroid, and entered another episode of truly sickening buffeting - Though she was trying her best to overcome her nausea, Juni watched eagerly as the body of one of the guards slid along the deck towards them - Desperately, she hooked one leg around the body and tried to hold it in place against the bottom of the seat. After a moment, she pushed the body so it sat nearer Faal.

He looked at her, curiously calm. "Can you reach...?" she yelled. "Faal...! Can you...? Try to get his gun!"

Almost reluctantly, Faal stretched over, straining against the straps, arms extended, and just when it seemed he could not possibly reach any further, his body elongated further and he managed to secure the guard's gun. At Juni's insistent urging, he gave it to her, and she immediately started adjusting it.

"What are you doing?!"

"Need the stun setting, if it has one... _Yes..._ That should work..." She glanced at the gun nervously, before turning it around to face herself and holding it against the central clasp securing her straps. "No, don't say anything...! I know this is a stupid thing to do, but it's the only option...!" Finally, she fired the gun directly into the clasp, and with a fizzing sound the locking mechanism deactivated and the clasp opened.

She was free.

* * *

To say that the pilot was busy would be putting it mildly, but at long last he was starting to regain control of the shuttle - the impacts themselves had in fact served to propel the vehicle away from the epicentre of the danger zone - Now, at last, he could stop to consider. He let out a breath, not realising he had been holding it in till now.

That was when he noticed the gun at the side of his head.

"You..." said Juni, "are going to do exactly what I tell you..."

* * *

Nic Haryl woke with a start, heart thumping, as his face slid off the cradle formed by his hand and slammed onto the table - Groggy, head aching and hand now in blood-deprived agony, he looked around the dimly-lit detention area of Revenant, his predicament slowly coming back to him with the inevitable sinking sensation accompanying it.

His life was over. No, worse. His career was over.

He realised he was not alone, and turned to see a silhouetted figure in the doorway. Expecting to see Darvin or one of the young women he apparently crewed his ship with, he felt suddenly very cold at the revelation of who this actually was.

The Mutoid moved into the light, and stared at him silently for what seemed like several minutes but was actually only that many seconds.

"What do you want...?" he demanded. It was meant to sound defiant, even imposing, but came out in a kind of croaky squeak. "What do you want?" he asked again.

No reply.

"I'm supposed to be afraid, is that it...? Well, forget it... Darvin...? Forget it! Your pathetic techniques won't work on me...! Do you hear me, Darvin?!"

The Mutoid replied. "Come" was all it said.

* * *

"What the hell is this...?" Haryl was still questioning the Mutoid as it practically dragged him along the service corridor, vice-like grip on his arm. "What are you trying to pull?"

The mutoid stopped, and if he didn't know better he would genuinely have thought it was confused by his question. "I am... pulling you..." it said expressionlessly. "Our destination is the flight-deck of this vessel. Your cooperation is required."

"Is this something to do with the turbulence...? I know Darvin is undisciplined, but I seem to remember he was at least a capable pilot."

"The ship is in danger. You are in danger. Is this motivation sufficient?"

He wanted to laugh. He wanted to so much. So he did laugh, and was sure the Mutoid arched a single eyebrow slightly in response. "You're saying... you need my help... Mine...?"

"Yes."

"Well... How can I refuse...? Lead on..."

* * *

"All this could be yours" said Brintun,

"All this _is_ mine" Servalan replied.

Brintun led Madame Orella - _No_ , Servalan now, again and always - through the main hub of Galaxy City. The civilian population had been locked away in designated _safe_ areas, _for their own protection_ of course, and an eerie silence prevailed despite the number of armed men and women present.

He offered a rare smile, watery and off-putting. "You are certainly unique" he mused.

"How I wish I could say the same for you."

He stopped, heels squealing on the smooth floor as he turned to face her. "Has it occurred to you-?"

"-If it has occurred to _you_ , probably."

"...That it might really best serve your interests for us to work together...? That our interests are not incompatible."

"You think not?"

"What you have built here is enormously impressive, and we have no intention of taking it away from you. You must understand that what we cannot have is a potential harbour for our enemies just as we expand our interests"-

-"And I am no longer one of those enemies, I take it."

"You never were. President Scarn was among those who voted against your arraignment."

"And used his considerable influence to make sure others followed suit- Oh... _No_ , he didn't go _quite_ that far, did he...?"

"Avalon was powerful, then. She dominated the provisional council. That has not been the case for many years." He tried another tack. "As a politician, you are without peer in our times... We recognise that. We want you on our side. We can make you more powerful than you ever were merely as President of the Federation." He moved a little closer. "Join us, Servalan." She noticed absently the droplets of sweat falling from his face onto the floor at his feet, and even onto his highly-polished boots. "Join us" he said again.

* * *

Darvin, Rissa and Caul found themselves being led along somewhat circuitous routes by their captors - Darvin and Rissa at least recognised that, and exchanged glances - Something was up, all right. Ramm's guards had been doing a lot of urgent, quiet talking into their comms, and getting more and more rattled.

They heard gunfire in the distance, and Darvin's ears perked up. "Hello hello..." he mused. Rissa smiled faintly.

"Hello hello..." Caul replied quietly, not sure what he was doing but trusting Darvin.

"I thought the fight was over..." said Rissa. "Sounds like they're having trouble." She tensed as two of the guards closed in on them, guns leveled.

"Come with us..." they demanded.

"I thought that's what we were already doing..." said Darvin. "Make your mind up, lads. Pick a route and stick with it..." he leaned closer to one of them. "Tell you what... One time offer only... I'll lead the way, and nobody, but nobody, needs to know you got yourselves lost in your own city... Can't say fairer than that, can I...?"

"Step back..." the guard said in a low voice.

"Certainly" said Darvin, seizing his gun and knocking him out with it before firing off one shot and tossing the gun to Rissa. She fired several more shots, and at the end of the salvo the few guards left standing were running for cover. A couple of them climbed over the edge of the gantries and dropped to the floor below, probably injuring themselves in the process.

"You should have taken the offer..." Caul informed the remaining guards as they surrendered, making Rissa laugh, though her gun-arm stayed steady as a rock.

Darvin had no time for that, however. "What's happening out there?" he asked them, stony-faced. They looked at each other sheepishly.

"There's fighting..." one of them said. "Not UniS, they're under attack too, same as us. We're getting conflicting reports... It's like... there's someone else here... Someone we weren't expecting..."

"All right, Darvin, we need to move..." said Rissa, calm and professional. "Shall I kill these traitors...? Please say yes."

"Leave them to this mysterious enemy" said Darvin. "Caul, you look like you want to say something. You got an opinion, I want to hear it - I promise you it won't be taken lightly."

"Just a feeling..." Caul said. "Something about this... It's familiar..."

Darvin nodded grimly, but realised they had been standing there too long. "Let's talk and walk" he said, and led the way. Rissa walked backwards behind them, keeping the guards covered till they were out of sight.

* * *

Juni stared at the forward viewer of the shuttle flight-deck, trying for the sake of the pilot to look more certain than she actually was. What to do...? Go back to Galaxy City...? Not while it was in lock-down.

"Now..." she said decisively. "Power down. Everything but life-support. Make us seem like just another piece of debris." She watched as the fragments drifted past. "I doubt we'll be noticed among all this." Holding the captured gun against the pilot's head, she added "Just that, nothing else. Then stay quiet... You understand...?"

Content with the brief terrified nod received in reply, she returned to the passenger section, and stopped short - Faal turned to her hurriedly, almost guiltily, dropping the body of one of the guards. The man was clearly dead. "What happened?"

Faal stood up and moved over to her. "I sometimes forget how fragile you are."

"Me?"

"Humans." He rubbed at his hands as if trying to remove some stain only he could see. "I needed to know."

"What?"

"Why they wanted _us_."

"Wanted _you_ , you mean... It isn't exactly the biggest mystery why UniS would want the last Clone Master in their custody."

"Last...?" he pondered. "I wonder."

Juni's eyes widened. "What did you find out...?" He did not reply, but the intense look in his eyes was like nothing she had seen there before.

He turned away, and she stood awkwardly for a few seconds longer. "I... need to get back to the cockpit" she finally said, and if Faal heard her he gave no sign of it.

* * *

"Yeah, I noticed the white-robed guys..." said Darvin, thinking on what Caul had told him even as he unwrapped the bundle Rissa had just handed to him. She kicked the hidden compartment closed and accepted the object Darvin handed her before putting it on her wrist. Soon, all three wore _Revenant_ 's teleport bracelets, and Darvin re-wrapped the spares. "It's definitely the same ones who took over your planet...?"

"Not likely to forget them" said Caul. "It's them all right. Here, I'll take that..." He took the bundle from Darvin so both he and Rissa were free to use their guns.

Rissa looked at the bracelet on her wrist. "We're still here, Darvin" she said dubiously. "Really glad this plan of yours depends so much on the Mutoids. Just wanted to tell you that."

"Plan is overstating it a bit" said Darvin. "But Revenant wasn't in the bay, so just give them a chance... They'll come through."

* * *

The three of them were reforming in Revenant's teleport bay before Darvin had entirely finished that sentence, and they found themselves feeling disoriented and not a little nauseous. But there was no time for that, so they stepped down off the dais in a hurry. "Three...!" Darvin greeted their crewmate exuberantly. "Thank you, and what kept you...? Not necessarily in that order."

"Delays were unavoidable" said Three impassively. "Nonetheless, if it serves you... My apologies."

"No apologies, Three... You did good." The four of them strode quickly along the main service corridor to the flight-deck and through the doors, hesitant and noisy in their opening as ever. Darvin and the others stopped short for a second at the sight that met their eyes when they stepped through.

"Captain on the deck...!" said Haryl, turning in his seat. "Captain Darvin, sir, the ship is yours." There was only a slight hint of mockery. "I stand relieved."

Darvin moved forward, declining to offer Haryl a reply. He spoke to the two Mutoids instead. "Why's he here?"

"There was an unforeseen obstacle to reaching orbit" said Three. "An additional crewmember was required... My apologies."

" _Initiative_ , girls...?" considered Darvin as he took up the main flight position. "I'm impressed. I really am. There's hope for you yet."

"So what happens to me...?" Haryl asked. "Back to detention...?"

"Actually, no..." said Darvin, half-concentrating on fixing the navigational interface in place of his hand. "We can't spare anyone to guard you... _So_ , here you stay."

"Well..."

"But make no mistake... We're at war now, and... Put it this way. Give me the smallest reason, and _now_ I wouldn't hesitate to kill you. Not for a moment. Clear...?"

Haryl's face looked resigned. "You're welcome" he said wryly.

* * *

Mara stepped through the doorway even before it had quite fully formed, and did not see it solidifying behind her, forming into a hexagonal portal in a wall composed of smooth black metal lined with strips of silver paneling. She was already focused on the small chamber ahead... An alcove with a comfortable-looking bed designed for a human, a table, chairs, storage spaces built into the walls - Everything needed for her immediate comfort. Except her freedom.

There was no other door, and behind her only the chaotic neutral space of the forming interior of the ship. "Well..." she said. "This is an improvement. Thank you."

 _"Confirmed"_ the disembodied voice answered, as the room trembled slightly. Had something impacted on the hull...?

"What was that...?" she demanded.

_"Greater specificity is required."_

"Are we in combat?" There was no reply, and she found herself speaking to the ceiling as she had in the testing centre back on Pelios. _"Test..."_ she pondered. "Was that a test back there? Was I being examined...?" She spun around. "I've been wondering where your crew is, but... Am I your crew...? Answer me...! Am I...? Computer... Who am I?"

_"Blake is recognised."_

She closed her eyes and breathed out slowly. "Are you programmed to obey me?"

 _"Blake is recognised."_ Had she imagined that, or did the dispassionate voice really have a slight reticent, _resigned_ quality to it now?

"Is Avon recognised?" She got no answer to that, but pressed on. "Is Orac?" She paused for a moment, and came to a decision. "Take me to them."

_"This course of action is not advised."_

"Are you programmed to obey me or not...? _Blake is recognised_ , you said. _I_ am Blake."

_"Confirmed."_

"Blake requires Avon... Take me to him. Now."

_Conflicting orders... Analysing... Reconciliation possible... Recalculating... New parameters accepted... Designated crewmember assembly delayed. Processing data... Confirmed._

* * *

One moment the alien was on their scopes, and looming large on the monitors of _Leviathan_ 's bridge - The next, it was gone. Scanner operators hurriedly reviewed their footage to ascertain exactly how and when it had disappeared.

"What...?!" Admiral Zanso exploded. "Pursue! Pursue...!" For good measure he bellowed "Pursue!"

 _"Sir..."_ said the First Lieutenant. "The other ships of the squadron are experiencing difficulties disengaging. Estimate an hour to be fully clear of the debris field."

"It doesn't matter..." said Zanso, a gleam in his eye. A rushing in his ears and a tingling throughout his body that he had not experienced in years. Certain, for the first time in _so_ long that he was, at that moment, exactly where he belonged. "That ship, wherever it is going, is ours... At all costs, we do not lose it. Pursue!"

* * *

**(Relevant extracts follow from the annals of the August Siblinghood of Morphenniel; Data adjunct 777X - Key undocumented events: Extrapolation of available data by use of quantum algorithms)**

**...**

**The 3rd century of the 2nd calendar**

**...**

**95th year**

**(Probable meeting of representatives of Erno Scarn, President For Life of the Ten Planets of the Proxima system, with the fugitive Kerr Avon. Balance of probability places this account within acceptable margin of reality - P** **resented, f** **or ease of data absorption, in prose style)**

"You're late."

"You were _early_. I am essential to this meeting; without me, it has no purpose; you, I dare speculate, are of relatively little importance in the broader scheme of things; therefore, _you_ were _early_."

The other man, one of President Scarn's private security force, stood back, cowed somewhat despite himself even as Avon submitted to a cursory patting down. He found a weapon, but Avon blocked him before he could remove it. "We said no weapons."

"And I assumed you weren't serious."

"I'm not letting you in there with that."

"Then farewell." Avon turned to exit back the way he came along the gloomy tunnel.

"Wait...! Honestly, you have to leave the weapon behind."

"No."

"But... why not...?" It was standard procedure... Didn't he know that...?

"Because I _might_ want to _use_ it."

 _"What's happening...?"_ the voice crackled from his comm-set.

"He's here... He won't cooperate."

_"You surprise me."_

* * *

"There you are at last." Brintun had made himself as comfortable as was possible in the control room of the old blast shelter, and tried to appear unconcerned. The copious sweating, made all the more obvious by the harsh emergency lighting, did not assist him in that aim.

"Here I am, yes indeed..." Avon said casually, and when Brintun waved him to one chair, he brought a different one forward and sat down. "What guarantee do I have I'll be getting out of here...?"

"The same guarantee I have. Our mutual goodwill... _Oh_ , very well then, our mutual interests."

"I very nearly didn't bother coming here, you know. Not exactly a promising start."

"I understand. A proper relationship has to start somewhere, however, and at some point we had to meet face to face."

"Have you brought it...?"

"It...? I'd have thought _him_... And I wouldn't have thought myself prone to anthropomorphise. Orac is quite a toy... but alas a quite unresponsive one..."

"Not a toy."

"...But perhaps a little bulky and impractical for the field, from what I'm told. Naturally we will want access... Part of the price."

"Part of it?"

"For what _you_ ask...? Not just a new identity... You see, you're not just a dead man, Avon, you're perhaps the most famous dead man among a whole species that has just become significantly more dead than it was before... That is quite a feat."

"I'd say... _second_ most famous, wouldn't you...? I've always tried to stay in the background... relatively speaking."

"And, naturally enough, you don't just want a new identity, but significant remuneration for all your... efforts over the years."

"Naturally. I call it _compensation_. You think I planned my life this way...? _Well_ , it's not over _yet_ , and I plan to spend the rest of it very comfortably indeed."

"And who could blame you?"

Avon's head turned a little to the side. "You'd be surprised."

"I do wish we could find some quick and easy way toward mutual trust, you know... It would make this whole thing so much easier..."

"I'm sure."

"Always awkward... That's why it's usually best not to bother." Brintun raised his hand and signaled, and another man emerged from the alcove where he had been hiding. He carried his burden, a large object shrouded in a cloth, over to a table and put it down before withdrawing. Avon looked unconcerned, as if all this had nothing to do with him, but his hand never strayed far from the concealed weapon.

"And I never got _you_ anything" he mused.

Brintun's glasses caught the light, making him more inscrutable than ever. He wandered over and removed the cloth, coughing at the resulting dust. "Well well... Hello, Orac..."

Orac was revealed, the little transparent box silent and dark, scuffed and battered from years of misadventure. Such a basically unimpressive device, but for Brintun it seemed to have an uncanny presence in the room. Not so much the object, but the possibilities it represented... Old it might be, but its capabilities were still unsurpassed. He who held Orac held the balance of power... and now _he_ held Orac.

"Activate it."

"Are you sure you want me to do that?"

"Whatever you had planned, I advise you to forget it..." Brintun said calmly, as his man pointed a gun at Avon. The other one from the tunnel came in to join him, his gun also ready. "However you planned this, you must trust me when I say, it's going to go somewhat differently... Oh, don't worry, that comfortable life that means so much to you... That needn't be impossible, even now... President Scarn rewards those who serve him."

"I never was one for servitude."

"Then you shall have to be more flexible." The guard carefully extracted Avon's gun from its holster and took it away, keeping his own weapon trained. "Now" Brintun continued. "The key."

"What key?"

" _Don't_ try my patience."

"Oh, you mean _this_ key..." said Avon with a broad grin, pulling out Orac's activation device. "You should have said." Still grinning, he dropped it on the ground and stamped on it. Under Brintun's astonished gaze, the grin vanished, and the eyes became cold.

Brintun took no chances at that point. "Kill him!"

A shot rang out... and the guard with whom Avon had argued in the tunnel toppled over, dead. Brintun whirled round to stare questioningly at the other man - _What...?_

 _Wait a moment..._ That wasn't what he had looked like earlier...

The other guard, tall and thin with a shock of curly hair starting to go grey, grinned rather more warmly than Avon had, and kept Brintun covered. "Good evening..." he said. "I advise you not to move..."

"You know I don't like that face" said Avon, stepping forward to make sure Brintun wasn't carrying any weapons of his own.

"Why do you think I wear it so much?" teased his companion.

"Make sure there are no more of them... Tarrant."

"Your wish is my command, Avon... Hang on, I think I might have slipped somewhat out of character there..."

The Inquisitor-general had extrapolated a graceful ageing process for Del Tarrant, and the grin was still boyish - until, all of a sudden, it vanished. "My first kill... With my own hands, that is... I thought I would feel... something..." He glanced at Brintun. "But it was easy. No problem at all." He turned and walked away.

Brintun just waited. This reversal had taken him totally aback, but he was still alive and that was somewhat promising. He glanced down at Orac's key. "Fake, I suppose."

"Real."

"Then why...?"

"Real, but superfluous. Orac has moved on." He indicated the transparent box, which as if in response to his gesture, lit up and started ticking over. "That is, as you quite correctly say, impractical. So much better to be _in the ether.._."

 _"Your use of such peculiarly primitive terminology..."_ fussed Orac, _"...is hardly descriptive, but if the object is to render an enormously complex process simple enough for a particularly feeble organic brain to comprehend, it may indeed be sufficient."_

"Put even more simply..." said Avon, "Orac has been away for a while. But now he is back, and he will be watching. On my behalf."

 _"If more pressing tasks will allow..."_ Orac added. _  
_

"You won't be able to see him", continued Avon, "but he will always be there. Watching. And if I don't like anything he sees, _I_ will be coming for _you_. Do you understand...?"

"I think I do, now..."

"Well, make sure it becomes just as clear to Scarn. You may keep the box, as a souvenir... Don't bother looking for me. If you do, I'll know. You look like you want to ask a question - What is it?"

"Your associate said _that_ was his first kill. So what happened to the man he replaced?"

" _I_ killed that one" Avon replied. "And it wasn't _my_ first."

"I see."

"And..." said Avon, "I didn't feel anything either."

**...**

**(Extracts concluded. Exiting backdoor... Deleting data retrieval signets... Deleted)**

* * *

**Galaxy City  
**

"So, _you_ have it now..." said Brintun, laying a moist hand on the box that used to permanently house Orac. He turned to Servalan, who was obtaining a drink on the other side of the suite. "If we'd known it would end up in your hands, we'd have placed some kind of homing device on it. And found you sooner..."

"Not much sooner... Orac wasn't easy to come by. And impossible to activate - Now I understand why... He left it with you...?"

"As a mark of contempt, presumably. We wanted Orac, so he gave it to us... In a manner of speaking."

"You've seen him more recently than I have..." she mused. "That I did not expect. I'm almost jealous..."

Brintun frowned. "Why?"

"Never mind." She wandered around the room. "All this time... All the effort it has taken to build this place, to build the alliances necessary to maintain it... To _build_ the trust... To _build_ loyalty... The most difficult part... All of it for nothing, without him..."

"What do you mean...?"

"I mean, he is necessary to me."

"You've been looking for him...?"

She nodded. "With some limited progress... I put my very best people on it. Then recently, something of a breakthrough..." She turned to him. "I have spent fifteen years searching for Avon..."

"So have we..."

She looked at him with an intense look in her eyes. " _And now_ we've found him..."

"We...?

She nodded again, after only a slight hesitation. "We."

He breathed out. "Well, of course, that only changes things up to"- He stopped as she activated a viewscreen and punched up a set of coordinates.

"The operations centre finished triangulating Orac's signal just before I lost touch with them..." she said. "Your handiwork, I assume. That last broadcast was the missing piece of the puzzle, it seems. Almost like it was timed deliberately, wouldn't you say...?" She smiled faintly. "An invitation, perhaps."

"Avon" Brintun breathed. He peered at the coordinates, and snorted his amusement. "That, I never expected. I wonder if he has been there all along, right in our"-

-"He gave you very good advice, you know... not to look for him. He will kill you if you make him. Never doubt it."

"And you...?"

"Kill me...?" She smiled in a way he found curiously difficult to interpret. "I wonder... It has always been an enticing possibility..."

* * *

The operations centre of Galaxy City was as silent as the hub, but even more unbearably tense. The operations staff manning the banks of consoles found themselves huddled around their monitor screens, more focused than ever, trying to pretend everything was normal. Terrified of making the wrong move. Trying not to look at the bodies on the floor.

The bodies of Ramm's security men, plus a couple of UniS troopers. The first to seize control of ops today, but not the last.

The staff made even more of an effort not to look at the white-robed figures standing over them, bladed weapons unsheathed and some still stained with blood. Miko leaned forward, the loose sleeves of his bloodied robe brushing against the main console. "Can you reach the Unified Systems flagship on this...?" he demanded. Receiving a terrified nod, he looked pleased. "Show me."

* * *

The takeover was not quite bloodless, but it was quick. Ramm's security, and even the rather better trained UniS personnel, were taken entirely by surprise when the threat emerged in the last place they would ever have expected it.

The civilians.

Only one in a hundred, probably - Considerably less perhaps, but the element of surprise was theirs. Months of infiltrating Galaxy City paid off very quickly as, without warning, the sleeper agents threw off their assumed personas and turned in efficient and deadly fashion to the task they had been assigned.

At first they were unarmed - Surprise, plus their proficiency in unarmed combat, gave them enough time to seize weapons - In no time at all, the upper hand belonged to them. Before much longer, so did the safe areas. After that, the hub.

Just like Pelios, just like so many places across the inhabited galaxy, Galaxy City fell to the Children of Light.

* * *

On its approach to Galaxy City, DSV-A1 had been cautious - slow, silent and, till the very last moment, unnoticed... Now was very different. Suddenly it was there, occupying space that had been empty immediately before, shining resplendent in the reflected light of the star known as Sol.

 _Force wall activated, scanners in operation... Local threats nil... Scanning approach vectors... Scanning... Vigilance to be maintained..._ The alien ship, with its one passenger, settled into synchronous orbit.

Above Earth.

* * *

"She's coming..." said Vila, or rather the Inquisitor-general in the shape of Vila. "Better make myself scarce."

"What are you so afraid of?" inquired Avon, as they both watched the image of DSV-A1 in orbit high above.

"Do I have to narrow it down?" replied Vila, and moved away into the shadows. Avon smiled.

"So, there you are..." he said to himself. "Here _we_ are, again..." He switched the image off, and was plunged into darkness for a few seconds before the lab's main lighting kicked back in. "Well, _Blake_... One last try...?"


	16. Chapter 16

* * *

**Earth**

_Teleport engaged..._

Mara felt herself dissolve into her component atoms and reassemble in another location, this time finding it a lot less disorienting and distressing. Almost pleasant, in fact. Which was more than could be said for the sight that greeted her on arrival.

She clutched the bracelet fastened around her wrist, her only link to the ship above and the - almost - safety it represented. Here it was - Earth. The cradle of the human race.

The landscape was all greys and browns, smirry with the light rain that was to start soaking through her clothes after the first couple of minutes. Low hills, their tops hidden in banks of mist, surrounded the more or less flat area she was standing on - squelching on, as she discovered when she started to move. Mara turned.

There it was.

The dome rose several hundred feet above her in a relatively gentle incline. From the very slight outward curve of the outer shell, its circumference must be... Big. Very big. If Caul were here...

Caul. She had left him behind. Why...? Oh yes, of course, something about him being safer back at Galaxy City than with her - Just as the place had erupted into a war zone. Well, he would be safer with Darvin and Rissa than with her... That, she was fairly sure of.

Fairly. After all, who was actually safe...?

 _If_ Caul were here, he could probably tell her very quickly the volume of the dome, but that kind of detail wasn't exactly what she needed at this moment. Mara really needed to know just what - and who - was to be found inside. And just how much of a danger they might be to her.

She felt inside the carrying pouch the ship had insisted she take, and once again eyed its contents - several bracelets like the one on her wrist - and shrugged it into a more secure position over her shoulder. It had insisted she take this, and then refused to teleport her gun along with her - And she had thought it would _obey_ her. So much for that.

The hatch opened in front of her. Without really knowing why, in fact not even sure she had voluntarily started moving, she was climbing the short flight of steps and stepping through the circular port into the dome.

Into the place where it had all started.

* * *

**Galaxy City**

The Children of Light, or at least those members included in Miko's advance party, found themselves very busy in the first few hours after their swift conquest of Galaxy City - Their biggest task was to confine the large number of prisoners they had taken. Some would undoubtedly join them willingly, some would join once they had seen the truth of their situation. Some would not, and they would have to be disposed of the usual way.

That could be left to his subordinates, and Miko himself focused on the small area above the hub not yet taken by his people. Any attempt to get through the automatic security devices would be extremely costly, and the computers controlling them had so far proved resistant to their attempts to deactivate them, so it appeared that the small number of UniS troops concentrated around their leader in that section might have to be dealt with rather more cautiously.

He opened a comm link to he Administrator's quarters, and waited for it to be accepted on the other end.

* * *

 _"We have blocked all outgoing and incoming signals to your location..."_ said Miko through the comms. _"You are surrounded and outnumbered."_

"Outnumbered, yes..." replied Brintun coolly. "But I have _trained_ soldiers, and you have a rabble of fanatics. You may have made short work of private security here, but do not imagine"-

-"It is clear to me you have always resented us..." Miko interrupted. "But I wouldn't have thought that would blind you to the simple facts of the situation. My people are no rabble, Mister Brintun. The men and women I brought with me are seasoned warriors, and they have a cause worth fighting for."

"Worth dying for?"

"Worth living for, certainly. Worth dying for...? If you had troubled to find out a little more about us, you would know that we recognise far less of a distinction between those two states than you do."

"Listen to me" said Servalan, bustling forward, tired of listening to this exchange. "This is Madame Orella, Administrator of Galaxy City..."

_"We know who you are."_

"Then you know you are dealing with a legitimately appointed"-

-"We know who you are..." he said again, seemingly impatient at her inability to grasp the point. _"Servalan."_ Miko gave a grim smile as he showed his hand.

She paused, but not for long. "Then you really _do_ know who you are dealing with."

"An animal trapped, its hiding place exposed, puffing itself up and attempting to trade on past... _glories_..." Miko replied. "Your day is over, Servalan. A new age dawns - Ours. Make way as best you can, or be destroyed. That was your warning."

There was real anger in her eyes now. "If you believe that then you have nothing to fear. You know where we are... Come and get us."

"We know about your automatic security system. Measures are being taken. And, quite frankly, we have time. You have very little. You have been beaten, Servalan. Accept that."

"Do please go on believing that..." she said, voice deep and smooth. _"By all means."_

Seeing this was getting out of hand, Brintun took over. "What is it that you actually want?"

Miko barely hesitated before replying. "What do we want...? What do you have...? You yourselves. Your bodies, your goods... Your very souls, willingly given."

"That may be difficult."

"I understand that. I too was reluctant. But I finally realised the truth."

"And what is the truth?"

"Surrender, and discover it for yourself."

"That's not going to happen." Brintun took a breath."We are besieged here, yes. But you are besieged too. An entire flotilla of UniS warships surrounds this place, and reinforcements are coming."

"Yes, that is true. But Galaxy city will hold out for some considerable time before being seriously threatened. The resources needed to maintain a blockade strong enough to starve us out, this far from your bases, would be considerable."

Brintun's mouth became a thin line as he became ever more tense. "Out of interest, was all this what you agreed with President Scarn?" he inquired, thinking he detected a faint chuckle on the other end, though Miko's features gave no hint of amusement.

_"Not exactly."_

"Then you have broken faith..." said Brintun. "And it is unwise to deal dishonestly with Unified Systems. Unwise, and dangerous. We are the future."

 _"In a sense that's true..."_ said Miko. _"The infrastructure you have established will be very useful to us one day."_ Brintun and Servalan exchanged glances. This was getting them nowhere. She mimed a cutting motion across her throat, and he leaned forward and deactivated the comm link.

"Well..." he said. "We seem to have reached an impasse."

"Not at all" said Servalan. "We have found out a great deal. Now it's time to go."

"You can just abandon this so easily...?" He encompassed her suite of rooms with a gesture.

"Did I say so...?" she replied. "Let us just hope they look after it all for me while I am away... Or they will suffer even more greatly when I return."

* * *

The UniS shuttle fell away, released from _Revenant_ 's grip to spin out of control among the debris of DSV-A1's attack, the hapless pilot still on board and trying to rig a makeshift distress signal. The former Federation frigate then found one of the largest pieces of destroyed asteroid and, under computer control, stuck with it so close that its signal would merge on the UniS flotilla's scopes and give Darvin time to consider his next move.

Their plan was shot to hell, that was for sure. It wasn't that they had underestimated their security force so much as _over_ estimate them - It still seemed incredible that they would side with a regime as notoriously unreliable as Scarn's over a proven stateswoman like Orella, especially as half the personnel did actually know, or at least suspect, who she really was.

"So..." he said, turning in his chair to address the others on the flight-deck. "What now?" He nodded to the beleaguered new arrivals - Juni and Faal - as they stepped onto the flight-deck escorted by the mutoid Two. Faal's ornate collar had been torn away and Juni's dress had been similarly torn and stained in the course of their ordeal - She accepted as Two offered her a black uniform jacket like that worn by Darvin, slightly too big for her, and she put it on.

"Isn't that our line, Captain...?" said Rissa next to him, not bothering to look up from her station.

"No, I'm throwing this open. I want to hear what you all think."

"What about Orella?" Rissa replied, going through the motions.

"What _about_ her?" said Darvin, eyes cold.

"Please tell me you're not serious." Juni had been standing with her arms folded, aloof, but now stepped forward to confront him - Back to her, Rissa chuckled.

"Of course he isn't." She swung her chair around. "You really don't know this man at all, do you...? Maybe if you'd got your head out of your arse at any point in the last five years and bothered to notice anyone but your"- Her eyes moved briefly to Faal, standing there silently, detached. -"You know what, let's not."

"No..." said Juni. "Let's."

"I thought that accident of yours had knocked some sense into you for a while there, but no, still the same old Juni..." Rissa slipped into a lisping insipid voice - "Oh _Faal_ , I'm a spoilt little shit and I'm so confused, notice me Faal, _please_ notice me..."

"Shut up" said Darvin before the enraged Juni could respond, voice as cold as his eyes. "Both of you." He glanced at Nic Haryl. "What are you looking at?"

"My old teacher" said Haryl. "The man who taught me everything I don't know."

Darvin smiled at that with genuine warmth and, leaning over the console to Rissa's station, flicked a switch. "Madame Orella..." he said into the mic. "Prepare to come aboard." He grinned again at the shocked response from the others.

* * *

"And this tunnel isn't on the blueprints for this place...?" Brintun demanded, uneasy in the narrow confines of the dimly-lit passage.

"Nor is it detectable by scanners, in the unlikely event that they bring those up before we reach our destination..." replied Servalan from the middle of their column. "I find your constant need for reassurance somewhat tiresome."

"How much further...?"

"Not far now."

* * *

The landing platform ascended through the rocky shell of the planetoid with a smoothness that belied its sheer scale, this time unencumbered by any of the spaceships that routinely used it for landing and take-off. Brintun and Servalan's UniS escort trained their weapons in all directions, feeling very exposed standing in the middle of the featureless metal plain.

As soon as they could, they hustled their charges to the edge of the massive steel platform and down onto the surface. Servalan accepted their assistance in clambering down off the platform as a matter of course, while Brintun did so without such aid in ill temper, having thought he had left all such indignities behind him long ago.

As they walked, Servalan found herself glad of her sturdy footwear, remembering all the same, with a melancholy feeling, the days when she thought nothing of navigating more hostile environments than this in high heels. Those days were gone.

 _How much longer...?_ The thought came again. _How much longer_ could she keep getting away with it...? As ever, it was quickly dismissed.

"I hope very much, for all our sake's, that this is not the full extent of your plan..." said Brintun, feet and joints already aching.

"Of course it isn't" Servalan replied. "We just need to put some distance between us and the entrance, that's all."

"Oh, good." He looked a little askance at her as she briefly put a hand to her ear and seemed to listen to something he couldn't hear.

"Yes, captain..." said Servalan quietly. "Stand by..." She stepped away from the others, and added, a little quieter. " _Oh_ , and widen the beam a little. I'm bringing a guest." She turned to Brintun. "How attached are you to these others...?"

He was nonplussed by that, but moved over to join her feeling more hopeful than he had all day. "What do you mean?"

"Would you leave them, if the choice was that or dying here yourself?"

"I am the President's personal envoy..." he began, but she cut him off with a gesture.

"That's what I thought... Now come here and take my arm..." Servalan managed to disguise her mild revulsion as Brintun hurried to obey. His men, sensing something wrong, shot curious glances at them even as their rearguard came hurrying up.

_"Sir... I think somebody's coming after us... yes, they definitely are pursuing... Sir...?!"_

A few military personnel - a small loss, Brintun reasoned. Scarn's cronies - no loss at all, and their own fault for coming here at all. They could be left behind, all right... "You're not wearing a bracelet..." he said quietly. "Nor am I. How...?"

"Aquicite crystals sewn into the hem of my dress" murmured Servalan. "And a transponder built into my necklace. Didn't I tell you...? I am never without an escape route."

* * *

 _"Three, did you get that...?"_ Darvin's voice crackled over the intercom, and the mutoid replied without glancing up "Acknowledged, sir."

With a final manipulation of the controls, two swirling forms shimmered into being in the teleport bay, coalesced and recognisably became Brintun and Servalan. Brintun staggered forward, shocked and nauseated by the transfer from the planetoid's surface, and stopped short as Three pointed a gun at him dispassionately.

His eyes darted to Servalan as if for reassurance, but his companion in the teleport beam found herself distracted as Juni and Faal hurried into the bay.

Servalan and Juni stared at each other for a moment till the younger woman rushed forward and enveloped the older in a hug. _"Darling girl..."_ Servalan said quietly.

Juni stepped back, apparently embarrassed by her action. "I'm sorry" she said. "I... thought you were..."

"I think I very nearly was..." said Servalan, and turned to Brintun. "Well... Welcome to _Revenant_ , Mister Brintun. A relic of the Federation, perhaps, but none the less effective for that."

"Like us?" he said warily, unsure what his status now was.

She smiled. "Precisely."

* * *

The UniS flotilla, minus their flagship and scattered by the exploding asteroid, had finally reformed and returned to the planetoid in attack formation, alert and ready for combat. If preventing _Revenant_ 's departure was one of their goals, they failed - The frigate slipped away quietly and anonymously as a piece of floating debris, activating the engines again after the initial burst only when well out of range of their scopes.

Darvin stood and greeted Servalan as she walked onto the flight-deck, and backed up a little as he saw Brintun. President Scarn's advisor, for his part, looked at Haryl reproachfully for a long moment before turning to Darvin - Haryl looked at _him_ with barely disguised contempt.

"Captain..." said Servalan with an expression that acknowledged just how much had happened since their last meeting - His gaze seemed to chime with that.

"Madame."

"There's very little time, so I suggest we just proceed."

"Couldn't agree more. But proceed with what exactly?"

"The only thing left..." she replied. "Our secret weapon."

 _Yes_ , he thought. _Our biggest gun, but a gun that's just as likely to kill you as your enemy._ What he actually said was "Avon?"

"Avon." She breathed out. "At last."

* * *

**Earth**

Mara's footsteps echoed along the empty corridors of the former Earth Administration dome - The only sound, apart from from her own breathing which, in her heightened state, sounded ridiculously and excessively loud. Only dim wall-mounted emergency lights still functioned in these areas and they cast long shadows, so every time she turned at a junction she caught a glimpse of something moving in her peripheral vision - Several times she got a start that way, and her nerves were before very long severely strung out.

"I'm here...!" she called. _What the hell._

No reply. No sign of life.

At the next turning, she caught the usual movement and this time there was no surge of adrenaline and quickening of her heart, till a moment later when she registered the figure darting out of sight at the end of the long corridor - She had not imagined it, there really was someone else here...!

She sprinted rapidly, silently, toward where she had seen the figure, trying to catch them unawares... Getting near, she threw herself around the corner and stood ready to face whatever awaited... She was rewarded merely with another glimpse as an automatic door closed twenty or so feet away, closed between her and...

No.

It couldn't be.

She ran again, till she reached the closed featureless door, and banged her fists on it. "Open it...!" she demanded. "I saw you... I... only want to talk to you. Please..."

It had been a little more than a glimpse this time, but she couldn't quite reconcile what she had seen. The large man with his mane of curly hair... No. It really couldn't be. _Pull yourself together._

The voice crackled through from some communications device she couldn't see. _"Oh, hurry up..."_ said the fussy professorial voice she had heard back at Galaxy City. _"You're keeping us waiting."_

"Who is that...?"

_"I'll make it easier for you... Follow the yellow markings on the floor..."_

"There aren't any mark"- Yes, there _were_ , somehow, even though there hadn't been a moment earlier. It wasn't a lighting effect, it was... "Are you hacking my chip...?" she asked, outraged - It was altering her perceptions, interfering with her brain. "How are you doing that...?"

 _"With great ease"_ it replied testily. _"Now, come. He's waiting for you."_

* * *

 _"We're off to see the wizard..."_ Rissa muttered under her breath with the slightest hint of a tune. Caul looked up from his station - they were on watch on _Revenant_ 's flight-deck, alone - Unless you counted the mutoid Two, which Rissa at least didn't.

He smiled. "I know _that_..." he said. "I didn't think anyone else..."

"I love libraries..." said Rissa. "The one in Galaxy City had pretty much all the audio visual material that survived from the First Calendar... Sometimes, whenever I could, I'd spend whole days there..."

"Me too... On Pelios, that is." Their thoughts both followed similar paths - Two of the greatest stores of knowledge in existence, both now held by the Children of Light. Were they called that because they were engaged in snuffing out the last true lights in the galaxy...? - "What do you think we'll find?" he mused.

"Maybe he'll give Darvin his arm and legs back... Maybe he'll give Servalan a heart... and Juni will get... whatever Juni wants. Something shiny, probably. What about you...?"

"What about you...?" Caul asked, almost at the same moment Rissa said it.

"Eyes...? That's what you were thinking, right...? New eyes?" She smiled gently. "I like my eyes the way they are, Caul."

"So what _do_ you want?"

"Just... to live another day and have some fun in the meantime..." Her mood darkened. "Anyway... Avon's no wizard. He's just a man, a man who has turned out to be very difficult to kill..." Her eyes narrowed. "I could kill him, if I was of a mind to. You just watch..."

"Have you met him?"

"No. Darvin has. And Servalan certainly has - Let's not wander into that swamp... No, I'm kind of hoping all our dealings with Avon are at a distance."

"Why?"

"Really...? Think about it. All the people who stood with Avon over the years... What do they all have in common...?"

Caul's precise and analytical brain swiftly went through the list... _Roj Blake, Jenna Stannis, Vila Restal, Cally, Olag Gan, Dayna_ \- but an exasperated Rissa interrupted. -"They're all dead, Caul. All of them."

As if some kind of spell was broken, the rest of their watch passed in awkward silence.

* * *

Mara walked through the last set of doors into the main laboratory, and spun around to see them close behind her - Studying the large space and its panoply of clutter warily, she investigated it section by section as if expecting to find someone hiding from her.

"I don't _hide_..." he said, his voice at once gravelly and tonally odd - She looked up. "Well, I suppose that's not really true, is it...?" mused Avon. "I _do_ hide... Very successfully."

"Till now."

He walked down from the overlooking platform to the main level and stood facing her - "As you say..." He smiled charmingly.

"Avon" she acknowledged. If facing Servalan had seemed strange to her, this was a whole new level.

"Blake" he acknowledged in return.

"Am I?"

He walked over to one of his work benches, ignoring her question and choosing to take another tack entirely. "Did you have a good journey?"

"I had an _interesting_ journey... The interior of that ship was in the process of forming around me."

"Yes..." he mused. "Years of _planning_ , and in the end it's always a bit of a rush to hit the _deadline_."

"All part of the plan, is it?"

"More or less."

"Feel like sharing it?"

"That wasn't on my list of tasks for today, no." He pointed at her. " _You_... have disrupted my plan somewhat... But don't worry, it'll soon be back on track."

"I'm so glad."

He looked at her for a few moments, growing amused. "I can't promise you will be, not entirely... But some of us, we don't get a _choice_... Our role is very much picked _for_ us."

"Oh, I'm like you, am I...?" Mara's voice was cool, her manner detached - Anyone else would be wary of the danger signals by now, but he seemed indifferent. He walked over to stand nearer her.

"I didn't think we would actually meet like this..." he said slowly. "It might make it all a little more difficult. But, frankly, I've been in worse situations... I think you might have too... Yes, you're the right one, I'm more sure of that now..." He turned away.

"The right one for what...?" she demanded.

He swung round to face her again, this time with a bench separating them. "In some ways, it might even be better if you don't _achieve_ too _much_... Your mere presence might be enough to swing the balance... The name is all it might take."

"The balance... What are you talking about...?"

A shrill alarm sounded, and Avon wandered over to a monitor. Viewing the readout, he manipulated the controls and a display appeared in the air above them - A spaceship in orbit, large and powerful, beautiful in its strange alien way...

"That's the ship that brought me here..." Mara reasoned. "That's... the Liberator!"

"Not quite..." said Avon, looking steadily at her. "The Liberator was destroyed twenty-eight years ago. But there's no reason for anyone _else_ to know that."

"What do you want of me...?" she asked, exasperated.

"No time for that now..." he said. "Your ship is up there, and it's not alone." He adjusted a control, and the view shifted to show another vast spaceship approaching - The UniS flagship, Leviathan!

"It'll be destroyed!" Mara exclaimed.

"We'll see."

* * *

On Leviathan’s bridge, Admiral Zanso leaned across the operations table and peered up at the screens intently. “How long till we’re in range...?”

“Our range, sir...? Or theirs?”

“Ours...”

“Fifteen seconds...”

DSV-A1 did not wait - It fired pre-emptively at a proven aggressor and started to withdraw to a higher orbit, with Leviathan in hot pursuit. Both ships crossed the terminator into night on the planet spread below them. Willingly or not, manned or not, they were now engaged in battle.

_Under attack... Deescalation of hostilities is first priority... Fallback position calculating... Combat procedures being affirmed... Readiness confirmed._

“Pursue...!” Zanso’s heightened adrenaline made him yell. “Don’t let it get away...!

“Sir, I suggest”-

“Pursue!”

* * *

The zone between the two ships was briefly alive as lethal ordnance pounded spectacularly against DSV-A1’s force wall, the electronic barrier becoming visible with every impact.

_Force wall damage report... Disruption of integrity reaching nine percent... eleven percent... thirteen percent... Warning, force wall reaching excessive demand on power levels... Estimate less than point-five solar hours before power banks are exhausted at current rate of demand... Confirmed._

The Liberator’s sister ship answered with another dazzling beam of focused energy that momentarily blinded any who saw it with the naked eye and disrupted systems throughout _Leviathan_ \- It sliced across the hull and opened several compartments to space. Still the barrage of ordnance continued, and _Leviathan_ stayed on its pursuit course.

"Maintain assault..." commanded Zanso. "It’s weakening!"

* * *

The atmosphere on the flight-deck of _Revenant_ was tense as it neared its destination. Darvin had plotted a course that would keep their approach secret until the very last moment, and the now nine-strong crew - if Servalan, Haryl and Brintun were counted - were ready to move into action instantly. Avon would have no opportunity to disappear again.

Thus they arrived in Earth orbit without warning, and as the flight-deck was filled with dazzling light and the instruments disrupted by a blast from DSV-A1, one of Leviathan's missiles struck them side-on, buffeting and disorienting them all. "Speak to me, Rissa!" shouted Darvin.

"Got nothing to say!"

"Caul!"

"We've been hit!"

"No shit...! Damage report!"

"Bad!"

* * *

The missile struck _Revenant_ amidships and shattered the ship's backbone, buckling the hull plates - Air escaped into space through numerous small hull breaches and the ship careered off course.

How could it all have gone so wrong, so quickly...? Darvin already knew what he would find, even as Revenant's systems rebooted one by one and the damage reports started coming in. As Rissa got them back roughly on course and away from the two huge vessels fighting it out, he studied the reports and then, despite the urgency of their situation, he studied them again.

He owed her that. _Revenant_ was his ship. His home. He had fought on it, and nearly died on it. But no more. He thought seriously, just for a moment, of not doing what every professional instinct now told him to do. Bite back the command, don't do it. Just stay... Stay forever.

"Abandon ship" he said in a monotone, just loud enough to be heard. 

* * *

They all rushed into the teleport bay and onto the pad, and Three took her place at the controls. Darvin hovered next to the calm Mutoid, eyes darting feverishly back and forth between the controls and the pad.

"Now..." he said. "You're sure you've got this. It's a maximum ten second delay... You don't have to be the one, Three... I could make it in that time..." Three glanced briefly at him, and merely replied. "Teleport ready, Captain. Please proceed."

He looked at her for a moment, and for the first time in many years his hand formed into the old Space Service salute, once second nature. "See you down there..." He rushed to join the others on the pad.

"Teleporting" said Three, and with the usual surge of static and shimmering light Darvin, Servalan, Brintun, Rissa, Caul, Juni and Faal disappeared and were transmitted to the surface of the Earth. Only Two remained - None had seen her quietly deactivate her bracelet at the last moment.

The Two Mutoids made brief eye contact, before both heading toward the flight-deck with calm precision.    

* * *

_"We have identified that interference, sir... Teleport beam!"_

"Trace it... Landing parties to the shuttle bays..." barked Admiral Zanso - "Capture them alive."

_"Sir - Admiral! Their ship...!"_

_Revenant_ maneuvered around Leviathan like a terrier tackling an elephant, taking substantial hits the whole way, and suddenly plunged inward and past their defensive batteries, hurtling toward its final destination. Zanso paled as he realised... The shuttle bays.

It was too late.

* * *

On _Revenant_ 's flight-deck, in the final seconds before impact, Two and Three sat at the bank of control stations, two chairs separating them as they strived to control all five duty stations simultaneously. In those final seconds, they both realised they had no more to do - every task necessary to accomplishing their goal had been performed.

They were free.

They locked expressionless eyes, and seemed to reach the same conclusion. Both arrived at the same simple need. Stretching across the intervening stations, their hands clasped together and held on tightly.

Impact.

* * *

 _Revenant_ exploded, the destructive wave radiating outwards and buckling the adjacent section of _Leviathan_ 's hull. Numerous personnel were blown out into space as several of the shuttle bays decompressed, and hull breaches opened across the whole section. Damage control parties, soon accounting for most of the crew, rushed into action to contain the damage and save the ship. Landing shuttles was now out of the question. Pursuing DSV-A1 was out of the question. Everything was out of the question except survival.

 _Leviathan_ was out of the fight, and _Revenant_ was gone. The last Federation warship was gone.

DSV-A1 performed a circuitous and distant orbit of the Earth before slowly returning to its original position.

* * *

Darvin sat in the mud. The others, huddled together in the cold wind and the rain, all watched him. He stared straight ahead, not moving, and several of them wondered if they should approach and talk to him, pull him to his feet, remonstrate with him, hug him, sit down there with him...

Unexpectedly, perhaps, it was Caul who moved forward. Eyes narrowed against the driving rain, he stood over Darvin till he was ready to start talking.

"Tell me..." Darvin began instead. "Tell me I got it wrong. Just tell me. Anything but the silence."

"You got... some things wrong..." said Caul hesitantly. "And a lot of things right."

"Like...?" Darvin let the water run down his face, eyes hollow, looking ten years older than before. And feeling much older still. That itch at the base of his spine was back - The itch where nothing was supposed to itch any more.

"She's waiting..." Caul subtly indicated behind them, where Servalan did indeed wait impassively. " _She_ waits for no one. But she waits for _you_." He swallowed. "You _must_ be special, eh...?"

Darvin grunted. "Suppose so." He looked up at Caul for the first time. "We all are, you know... We're survivors... We survived. Most didn't."

"Let's, _uh_ , go on surviving."

"Do we have to?"

"I think so."

"You really are a pain in the arse, Caul."

"Thanks."

"Now help the robot man up. He's stuck in the mud and starting to rust."

* * *

"Did they make it out...?"

"Who?"

"Caul and the others... Please tell me they weren't on that ship when it did that."

"All right..." Avon said, affecting bemusement. "They weren't on that ship when it did that."

"Don't mock me" said Mara dangerously.

"Not bad for a ship without a crew..." mused Avon once he had located DSV-A1 and satisfied himself it was undamaged. He turned to Mara. "Just imagine what it could do with the full seven."

"Seven?" Mara asked, curious. Unnoticed - or had it been? - she had seized his gun from the bench and was holding it trained on him, hands steady. "Why seven?"

"A full complement" he said, apparently oblivious to the gun pointed at him. "If you count the onboard computer. Or, sometimes, if you _don't_... It is _something_ of a _grey area_..." He walked over to a bench, and she moved to cover him with the gun. "Tea...?" he asked.

"What's tea?"

"You come from a jungle planet, and you don't know what _tea_ is... Interesting."

"The gun isn't bothering you at all, is it?" Mara demanded, rattled.

"Not in the slightest."

"You're not concerned it might kill you?"

"Define _concerned_."

Abruptly, Mara fired the gun - and smiled.


	17. Chapter 17

In orbit of Earth's moon, the UniS flagship _Leviathan_ was a hive of activity inside and out, undergoing emergency repairs. The gaping wound left by _Revenant_ 's cruel impact still threatened the vessel's basic stability, and time was of the essence if it was to be saved.

"No...! What will happen is this - You will listen to me, a full Admiral, and you will learn how the chain of command works... If an Admiral demands priority, an Admiral receives priority...! I do not wish to know about such details, it is your job to facilitate what I need! And what I need, and I cannot quite believe I have to go through this again, is dropships! Assault craft! Marines! Heavy artillery! And I need them now!"

Admiral Zanso switched the comm-link off in a foul mood and collapsed back in to his chair in Leviathan's flag officer day-cabin - His again, now President Scarn had vacated it at last. He rubbed a hand over his eyes, and sighed as a beep announced the arrival of another visitor - The doors opened and a very attractive dark skinned woman in her late forties hurried in, electronic pad in hand.

"What do you want?" Zanso was impatient, but his voice was not inherently disrespectful - Doctor Lenta Guld was not to be trifled with, not only because of her considerable professional abilities but because of just _who_ her friends were. "How's the First Lady...?" Zanso inquired. "I haven't"-

-" _Well_ , the last time I saw her... and still no doubt quite taken with you..." Guld said with a faint smile. "But that's not what I've come to talk to you about."

"Unless you've come to talk to me about expediting my requests to Proxima Five, Doctor, I"-

-"Time for the latest intelligence updates - Oh don't look like that, take your medicine like a good boy...!" Guld plugged her pad into the receptacle on Zanso's desk and said "Screen...!"

The holographic display engaged, and an image hung in the air before them - a young dark-skinned man in the uniform of the old Federation - "Yes, I know - Stev Darvin..." said Zanso wearily. "He's older than that, now."

"That's to be expected" said Guld wryly. "And where Darvin is, who else do you think we might find...?"

"No...!" Zanso was already sitting up with some interest before the next image appeared, replacing young fresh-faced Darvin - The cold gaze of the black-gowned, crop-haired, infamous Commissioner Sleer, soon replaced by another image, this one of a young, white-gowned prodigy, the youngest Supreme Commander the Federation Space Service ever had - One and the same person. "Servalan!" said Zanso. Now she had his attention.

"And to complicate things, it seems Darvin and Servalan are now holding the President's chief advisor hostage."

"Does it really complicate anything...?" asked Zanso.

Guld just smiled. "You ever heard of dominoes, Admiral...?" she mused. Without waiting for an answer, she changed the image again. "Kerr Avon."

Zanso looked back and forth between her and the image. "She's found him." It was not a question.

Guld nodded. "It is believed so. Down there on the Earth. And we have a nasty feeling we know where too... Unfortunately, our predecessors in the Federation were somewhat careless during the evacuation of Earth, and left some very useful things behind... Certainly useful for a man like Avon."

"Then the situation is even more urgent that I feared..." said Zanso. "A swift and devastating assault is what's required, and soon!"

"There's one more thing... and you're not going to like it..."

"You are joking, I assume..."

"It's something Carnell warned us about some time ago"-

-"Don't mention that name." The image changed to that of a young dark-haired woman, a spy image taken as she emerged from a doorway on some backwater world, and Zanso stopped - "Who is this...?"

"Her name, apparently, is Blake... Yes, you heard correctly... Now you see." More information scrolled down the screen, and Zanso skim-read it. "The appearance of this young woman... then that of the Liberator-type ship and the battle at Galaxy City..." Guld continued. "It all looks disturbingly like the reemergence of a political movement we all thought was long buried in the past... And the last time it was active..." She didn't need to go into any more detail.

"I wasn't here at the time of the Blake affair..." said Zanso briskly. "My squadron was putting down the Achilian rebellion for years, then the Andromedan wars... I heard it was bad."

"They were very successful for a while... The last thing we need"-

-"Yes..." said Zanso. "Well, I promise you... In a couple of days it won't matter... They'll all be dead."

* * *

"You know..." said Avon, looking at the scorched area of wall behind him, fizzing and crackling, "The electrical wiring is built into the walls here... You could have done some damage."

"I just wanted to see how you would react..." said Mara, detached.

"And what did you find out?"

"I'm not sure."

"Then it was a pretty pointless exercise." He strode across and took the gun from her, with only a moment of hesitation before she released it. "Mine, I think... Forgive me, but when your life depends on such a thing you become a little proprietorial about it."

"And careless... Or is that just old age...? Blake-killer..."

Avon's reaction, though tinged with amusement, was mainly rueful. "Well... If that's what I am, then anyone making a habit of calling themselves _Blake_ should think very carefully before coming here."

"That name opens doors" Mara said breezily. "Was that a threat?"

"And closes many others, you'll find."

"Was Blake's clone my father?"

He seemed surprised at the question, and uncomfortable with the whole subject. "Why are you asking me?"

"You were there."

"And so was Servalan."

"She doesn't know."

"She told you that...?" he pondered, amused.

Mara started to ask again, more insistently. "Is"-

-"I'm not an expert on clones... But, if you _really_ want a _reasonably_ informed opinion, I would say _probably_ not."

"All right..." she said, brow wrinkling a little. "I don't know what I expected"-

-"Coser!" he said abruptly, relentless, in a toneless voice. "Yes..." he said, peering at her face. "I think almost certainly."

Mara didn't trust herself to reply for a good few seconds. "Not Coser... Please, not him."

"Why not...? Can't say I took to him, particularly, in our brief acquaintance, but the man's faults were not genetic." He started to walk toward the exit.

"Shut up..." she said quietly. "Why can't you just...?" She became calm again in an instant. "Perhaps you should have kept that to yourself after all... Or perhaps I shouldn't have asked."

He turned back. "After you came all this way..." he mused. "You don't want to kill me, you don't want me to speak... What do you want of me...?"

She took a breath. "I don't know any more."

"Well, when you've made up your mind, come and find me... _Till then_ , I have work to do, and I'm a little behind." He started again to move toward the door.

"Can"- she started, and stopped. "Can I... help?"

He turned back to her again, and after a moment he grinned broadly.

* * *

Seeing that Brintun was walking just ahead of her, Rissa leaned forward to talk to him. "Hi... Just to let you know, if you need any assistance at any point, I'll be right behind you... All right...?" Brintun did not reply, and she gently squeezed the nerve between his neck and shoulder. "Right behind you." She smiled and fell back to walk alongside Darvin.

"Very subtle" he said.

"Oh, thanks, boss...!" They walked in silence for a few minutes - trudged, actually, Rissa thought - through the narrow muddy valley, toward the massive power readings the teleporter had aimed them at. Brintun and Haryl were out in front - where they could see them, and the first to trigger an ambush, or the place of honour as far as they were told - they were behind with Caul and Servalan brought up the rear with Juni and Faal. _"Boss boss boss boss..."_ she murmured, barely audibly, bored with the silence.

"You're holding up all right, then..." Darvin observed.

"Been through worse."

He smiled faintly. "I know you have..." he mused. "I know."

"I haven't..." said Caul. "Is it strange, though, that I'm kind of enjoying this?"

"No..." assured Rissa with a smile.

"Yes" assured Darvin, grim-faced.

Rissa gave Caul a look that said _Don't mind him_ , and took his arm as they walked - She turned again to speak to Darvin. "Boss?"

"Yes?"

"They must have..."

"Yes, they must. Explains why we aren't being pursued."

"But you'll miss the ship more than the Mutoids, won't you?"

"Of course I will. I don't feel especially good about that fact, but it is nonetheless true."

"Captain..." called Servalan quietly from behind them. With a little difficulty, Darvin fell back to walk alongside her. "I'm sorry about your ship..." she said. "I hope soon I'll be in a position to provide you a better one."

" _Your_ ship, I think."

"We both know better than that."

"What do you expect to find here, exactly...? Fifteen years is a long time... Avon will be quite an old man by now."

"Indeed..." said Servalan dryly. "He and I are more or less the same age."

"Sorry... But I mean... People change."

"Not us."

He looked a little askance at her. "Really...?" he said. "I mean, really...?" Servalan frowned, not immediately grasping what he meant by the question, but when she realised she looked angry. "I'm sorry..." he said, looking at the landscape ahead. "Not my place."

"I"- Servalan began, but the sentence ended there.

"As I said... Not my place." Darvin aligned himself with Caul and Rissa once more, and Servalan by default ended up walking alongside Juni and Faal - She ignored Juni's look of concern entirely.

Up front, Haryl gestured for them to stop, automatically using a signal once taught him by Darvin himself, and Darvin's old reflexes kicked in. Halting their procession, he hurried to join Haryl. "What's up?"

"A vehicle, I think... Came down somewhere over there..." He indicated ahead and off to their left.

"You're sure?"

"Well no, as it happens, but I thought it best to share."

Darvin smiled. "Sorry... How'd you want to proceed?"

Haryl looked at him askance. "How do I?"-

-"You're the serving officer, aren't you...?"

"For now."

"All right, everyone..." Darvin called, just loud enough to be heard. "Just stopping for a short rest..." To Haryl - "Reconnaissance...?"

"Me...?"

"I think I can trust you."

"Do you, now...? Interesting."

* * *

"What do you think...?" Avon asked, as Mara finished her brief tour of the dome's auxiliary operations room - During his time here, Avon seemed to have stripped, re-calibrated and reassembled practically every piece of equipment, and though she tried to look unconcerned she was frantically trying to work out exactly what his purpose in doing so might have been.

She shrugged. "Of what...?"

"Don't be disingenuous."

"If I had any idea what you were doing, maybe then I could venture an opinion."

"Or modest."

"All right then..." She once again ran an eye over the complex array Avon had constructed - Walking along the main bank of consoles she skim-read the readouts. Finally, she looked up at him.

"You've set up some kind of communications network..." she suggested. "But... you have Orac. So..."

"So..."

"So it's more than that..."

"Or less."

"One signal, massively boosted... Are you trying to communicate with the Andromedan galaxy...?"

He smiled. "That's good. Lateral thinking - that's very good. But no. That's not it."

"A weapon... Some kind of sonic weapon..."

"Not sonic." He turned and climbed the set of stairs going back up to the exit.

"An electronic pulse!" she cried. That stopped him instantly, and he turned on the stairs to face her. He smiled again, mouth closed.

"Go on."

"A hell of a defence... Except you could only use it once. Once an attacker knows about it, they go into fixed orbit on the other side of the planet and send in dropships... Even drop a nuclear device on you more powerful than this place was built to withstand..."

"It can only be used once anyway... It will burn out all the circuitry. I don't have anything here capable of sustaining the pulse for more than a couple of minutes."

"Why then...?"

"That will be enough... Ten seconds will be enough."

"Once a terrorist...?"

"And you call yourself _Blake_..."

"I'm starting to reconsider that."

"Then you need to make up your mind, once and for all! This is not a game!" His sudden fury thoroughly took her aback, and she just stared up at him. He continued, fury only slightly abated - "Well, I'm starting to reconsider too... Maybe you're not the one I need after all... Only, it's far too late. There is no one else."

"And just what do you need me for...?!"

"To _do_ what _he_ did."

"I don't know what that means" she told him, meeting his gaze unflinchingly.

"Yes, you do." He turned away.

* * *

"We're wasting time" said Servalan calmly. "Worse than that, we're vulnerable."

"Inherently..." Darvin turned to her briefly, and raised both eyebrows. "Trust me. You know you employ me for a reason."

"You there...!" The voice, out of nowhere, made them all snap to alertness and raise their weapons. Darvin and Rissa exchanged glances. Both knew how short of ammunition they were.

"Hi...!" said Darvin. "Come on out!"

Haryl came first, shame-faced and humiliated once again, led at gunpoint by several rough-looking men and women with rugged and practical clothing, patched-up multiple times. Darvin had little difficulty picking out the leader - a hard-faced but unassuming-looking man a few years older than Darvin himself. The others clearly deferred to him.

"Stev Darvin."

"Dain Kever."

"Hi, Dain."

Kever seemed a little amused, and replied "Stev". A sense of humour... If he had a sense of humour, he wouldn't be beyond reason... Darvin noted with interest the curious-looking adolescent boy at Kever's elbow, his presence an apparent source of irritation.

"Your son?"

"Adran Kever..." said the boy.

"Hi, Adran."

"Hi...?" The word itself seemed strange to the boy.

"Well, this is a situation..." mused Darvin.

"Yes" said Kever after a moment.

"Scavengers...?"

"Colonists" Kever corrected him.

"Sorry."

Kever - slowly so as not to alarm any uneasy trigger fingers - made a gesture that encompassed their surroundings. "No one else using it, is there?"

"Not at the moment" said Servalan. Kever took a good look at her, and Darvin thought he detected a faint frown.

"You're in charge...?" he asked Darvin, seeming to question that for the first time.

With only the slightest pause, Darvin replied. "Yes. Senior officer present."

"But not UniS..."

"No..." Darvin answered with a grin, then waved a hand toward Haryl. "Well, he is... Sort of."

"I am a Unified Systems officer," said Haryl officiously, "And what you are doing is"-

-"A misunderstanding..." said Darvin. "A completely understandable one." He glared a warning at Haryl, but noticed Kever's gaze had shifted to Faal, standing almost hidden behind the others as much as his height would allow.

"And what's that...?" said Kever.

"You've never seen a non-human?"

"Only ones disguised as humans..." Kever replied, a haunted look briefly in his eye that Darvin recognised all too well.

"To clarify..." said Faal, "My DNA is actually ninety-nine point nine s"- Juni's brief squeeze of his arm stopped him there.

"Why are you here, Stev?" Kever asked casually, and his glance went briefly back to Servalan.

"Visiting someone. An old friend we haven't seen for a while." Darvin thought it best not to actually lie.

"In there...?" Kever's head bobbed back a little and to the left, and he didn't fail to notice the reaction that rippled through Darvin's group - So, they didn't know exactly where the dome was... "Where's your ship?" he asked.

"Destroyed" said Darvin, and he could feel the disapproval like waves of radiation emitting from the others onto his back.

"Crashed...? You don't look too badly off, considering."

"We evacuated in enough time..." said Darvin. "Listen, Dain - I understand your caution, but maybe it's time to relax a little."

After a few moments, Kever cautiously nodded, and both groups lowered their guns slowly and in precise synchronisation. He indicated the path ahead and the slope upwards to the right, and Darvin took that as an invitation - The two of them climbed up, both noting the slight difficulty the other had in doing so, and for the first time Darvin saw it.

The dome.

"Wow..." he breathed. "Never seen it from the outside."

"You've been in there...?"

"I was born in there."

"You'll know how to get in safely, then..." Kever pondered.

"Alas, no..." Darvin said. "We didn't tend to go in and out, except by shuttle... And then only with authorisation... Um, I'm making it sound kind of horrible, aren't I... What can I say, it was home." He looked at Kever steadily. "No, sorry, one thing I don't know how to do is get past the defence systems... You're not catching me on the up right now."

"Then it is fortunate that I can" said Servalan, standing just behind them.

"That is fortunate..." said Darvin thoughtfully.

"It is..." mused Kever. "What did you say your name was again...?"

"I didn't." Servalan stepped back down onto the path. "Now, shall we get on with this...? It will be night soon." Darvin and Kever exchanged dubious glances.

* * *

"What's the target?" Mara inquired casually, like it was of little importance.

"Why don't you work it out?"

"Because I'm tired of being tested."

Avon smiled faintly. "That's understandable."

"UniS?"

"Accurate, but not specific. Try harder."

"Don't push it, old man..."

"Don't disappoint me so much, _young woman_... "

"Somewhere in the Proxima system, presumably..."

"Accurate, but _too_ specific!"

"The Proxima system..." She looked at him, then at the array of cobbled-together equipment, then back to him, disbelieving the evidence of her own eyes and her own wits... "You'll disrupt their communications..."

"I will end their communications...! And everything else that relies on any kind of electrical charge! Plunge an entire civilisation back to the level humankind enjoyed before the First Calendar..."

"You would actually do that...?"

"Destroy the new Federation before it has a chance to grind the entire galaxy under its heel...?" Avon broke their eye contact. "No."

She breathed out. "Why do all this, then...?"

" _You_ will...!"

"What...?"

"Or at least, you might..." He moved closer. "This is far beyond what Blake ever achieved. Even the destruction of Star One didn't do as much damage to the Federation as this would do to Unified Systems... Think on it!"

"I have...! I don't have anything against the millions of people"-

-" _Billions_ , I believe..."

"People who would suffer because of this. My quarrel is with their masters... If I even have a quarrel with them! Perhaps it's inevitable, the endless cycle of oppression and revolution... Maybe it's pointless to just keep turning that wheel over and over and over again...!" She paused, disturbed by his hooded stare. "Why are you looking at me like that?"

 _"You're not Blake..."_ he said slowly.

"It seems not."

"You _might_ be someone I can work with."

"Or kill?"

"Why would I kill you?" His response was guarded.

"Why did you kill Blake?" she shot back immediately.

He paused for some time before his answer finally came. "By mistake..." he said. "A terrible, terrible mistake... He made mistakes too. He kept some things from me he shouldn't have. And I was... different then. Not as able to see things clearly. Not as..." He just stopped there.

"You regret it..." Mara did not quite phrase that as a question, but it seemed to invite an answer nonetheless.

"Of course I do," he admitted quietly.

* * *

"Careful..." warned Kever as they advanced cautiously up the slope towards one of the dome's entrances. "This is about as far as we can safely go."

"Yeah...?" Darvin queried. This was all still a little strange to him - Inside there was the world he grew up in - and it had been his whole world till he had been picked out for the Academy - Just outside had been this wasteland, and he had never given it a thought.

Kever pointed. "See that stain over there on the ground?" Darvin and the others just behind them followed his finger, and indeed it was just possible to see the remains of something, some kind of faint residue...

"What's that?"

"Friend of mine," said Kever, and volunteered no further detail. He beckoned Servalan to the front. "Now, let's see if you're quite as impressive as they all seem to think you are."

Servalan met his eye calmly, with perhaps the faintest hint of disdain for questioning her. "Certainly" she said, and started walking towards the entrance. "Are you sure about this...?" called Darvin. He got no answer.

Juni started to follow, but Faal gripped her arm and waited till she realised the folly of what she intended. She wriggled out of his grasp and shot him a look that said _Don't worry_.

Now she was facing away from all of them, and seen by no one, Servalan's expression had changed somewhat. Her breathing was shallow but rapid, and she felt like she had a lead weight lodged somewhere behind her ribs. Any moment now, this could be it... She could die.

A glance up - Yes, there it was, well-concealed if you didn't know where to look... _Are you watching...? Are you...? You had better be. I wonder if you can resist the temptation to kill me... I doubt I've ever given you a better chance._

* * *

"Intruders at north entrance C-Alpha..." Orac's disembodied voice called across the main lab, managing to strongly imply that the task of warning them was well beneath him but he was doing it anyway. "I say again, intruders."

Avon moved to a terminal and sat to view the security feeds. It took a few seconds to narrow it down to the correct one - Then, from Mara's point-of-view, unable to see what he could, he abruptly sat back and exhaled sharply. He was back under tight control in under a second, but she saw his shocked reaction.

"What is it?"

"Nothing vital..." Although she couldn't see him, Avon locked his gaze with that of Servalan for the first time in over fifteen years. "So..." he said quietly, "It has come to this."

Unwilling to be fobbed off with his response, Mara moved round to where she could see the screen, and her response, after a moment of thought, was this - "Could you kill her from here?"

"Yes."

"Will you?" Her face was expressionless, as if she was asking casually what hour of the day it was. His, when he turned to face her, was much the same.

* * *

Servalan actually gasped with the released tension when the entrance hatch released and started to slide open ahead of her, and tears actually welled in her eyes... She was very glad no one could see her. _Well..._ She glanced again at the hidden camera. _You can. But how long since we had any secrets from each other, you and I...?_

Without hesitating, without even thinking, she stepped forward and made her way through the hatch, disappearing into the relative gloom beyond. The others watched, too far away to intervene, as it swung shut behind her.

Darvin thought furiously as the others reacted with varying degrees of disbelief and even dismay. What course of action he might have come up with was to remain obscure, however, as the decision was taken out of his hands.

 _"You there..."_ said the fussy elderly man's voice from the bracelet he still wore on his wrist. _"I said, you there..."_

Darvin held the bracelet up to his mouth slowly, as if giving himself just a couple more seconds to think. At last, he spoke. " _Orac_ , I presume..." he said calmly, unwilling to concede any disadvantage to this supercilious AI.

 _"I should never presume, if I were you..."_ said Orac. _"But you are nonetheless correct in this instance. Even the most imprecise instrument can randomly happen upon pertinent data."_

"What do you want?" Darvin said abruptly.

_"You are to proceed to north entrance D-Sigma with some expedition, there to await further instructions."_

"Is this an invitation...?" Darvin inquired. "How come we don't get to go in the same entrance as Servalan?"

 _"Now you are simply wasting time..."_ said Orac irritably. _"What precise nuance of the word expedition eluded your comprehension...?"_

Once again, somehow, they all managed to confer quite adequately without speaking - Every one of them had a look that said _What's the choice...?_

* * *

"Was that wise?" asked Mara.

Avon stood up slowly, looking like it had cost him a lot of effort. "Probably not," he said at last. "Sometimes, you have little choice."

"Well..." She smiled faintly. "I didn't kill her when I had the chance either."

"She murdered your mother." That came from nowhere, stated as a matter of simple fact - It was almost like, being unable to kill Servalan himself, Avon was hoping she would do it for him.

"I suspected that."

"And?"

Mara rubbed her eyes, suddenly realising just how tired she was. "I never knew her." Meeting his impassive gaze, she felt the need to explain further. "Everything was so different back then... I mean, revenge for this, revenge for that... Where does any of it end...? I just... can't go to that place. I thought I could, but I can't."

 _"But I can..."_ The unseen observer, listening in on their conversation, chose that moment to quietly slip away. There was work to do, and questions to be answered.

* * *

Zanso had received something around half of the reinforcements he had requested from the Admiralty on Proxima V, and now at last, at long last, his force was mobilising for the assault on Earth. He would be the one to finally end the Blake insurrection, and end the threat posed by Avon, by Servalan, by her lackey Darvin and by this young woman calling herself Blake - That above all seemed to have everyone else rattled, but Zanso looked forward to the endgame.

If, in the course of events, the odious Brintun should accidentally come to harm, that would be unfortunate. He believed it somewhat likely.

Thus Doctor Guld's latest interruption was even less welcome than her previous one. Much as he respected her abilities, a visit from Lenta Guld never boded well.

"A communication from the President..." she began, holding out her pad. Something she never did... Just how sensitive was this communication?

"From Proxima II?" he asked as he took the pad, squinting a little - "From Storm Mountain..." she replied, an eyebrow raised as if to preempt his mild surprise.

"Is he taking this entirely seriously...?" Zanso pondered.

"He takes it very seriously" said Doctor Guld quietly. "Very seriously... Admiral, those are your orders of engagement. For your eyes only." At the moment she said that, the pad read Zanso's retina scan and the relevant file opened and allowed him to read the communiqué...

Reading it, and becoming progressively more ashen-faced, Zanso finally handed the pad back to Guld and allowed her to skim it. They both looked at each other for a long moment.

"This changes things..." she said.

"If he fires that weapon..."

"He can't..." she said firmly.

"And if he does...?"

"Then, _Admiral_..." said Doctor Guld firmly. "You place your ship in its path and hope to be hit. Because if you fail, I would not recommend at all that you survive..."

* * *

Servalan advanced along the corridor as if she belonged there - Indeed, there had been a time when she did. Apparently without a care in the world, she looked for some sign of where to go - "The least you could do is come to meet me..." she said aloud. "Afraid to face me again, is that it...?"

Feet scuffed slightly on the ground as an unseen observer turned and moved away. Servalan, just a little alarmed, no more than that, listened carefully. "Is that you...?" she called.

After quite some time, a voice replied - but not that of Avon. _"That depends, Supreme Commander... Who was it you were expecting...?"_ Spinning around trying to identify the voice's source, Servalan tried to control her panic and not show the slightest hint of being rattled.

"Where are you...?"

 _"That's a very good question..."_ said the voice, almost sing-song - A mature male voice, still with a hint of the slums he had grown up in before his exceptional talents had been identified by the Space Service recruitment specialists. _"And the answer is... Supreme Commander... I've been in hell... I'm going back there soon..."_

"Show yourself...!"

_"But when I do, this time I won't be going alone..."_

"You think I'm afraid of you...?" Servalan demanded, a brittle edge to her voice. _Of course you are_ , he thought. _That's why I'm here..._

"Here I am... Supreme Commander. You did ask me to show myself..." She turned to face him, knowing despite all reason what she would see and steeling herself for the reality of it. For a long moment she said nothing.

"Why aren't you dead?" she asked quietly.

"Oh... I am," said Travis.


	18. Chapter 18

_"All right then..."_

Now he was actually here, Darvin eyed the waiting hatch, the one that would grant them access to the dome where he had been born and - _more or less_ \- raised, with a little trepidation - He turned to Kever and Haryl, standing just behind him.

"Dain... Are you sure you want to go in here with us...?"

"I'm sure I don't want to go anywhere near this place..." said Kever, grim-faced. "But if something here presents a threat to my people, I have a duty..."

"I think... It's just, I really think you'd be better _getting_ your people far away from here, at least for now..."

"What exactly do you think is going to happen...?"

"I really don't know - But I'd feel a lot better knowing you were all at a safe distance when it all kicks off..."

"But naturally _you're_ going..."

 _"Yeah..."_ said Darvin. "I never was the brightest... All my teachers said so."

"So did my teacher..." Haryl remarked, and he and Darvin eyed each other assessingly. "But he was wrong about most things."

"One thing, possibly..." Darvin conceded, moving over to stand next to him. "Feel like organising an exodus...?"

"What's that...?"

"Feel like doing the right thing for the first time in your life...?"

"Go with _them_...?" Haryl demanded, incredulous.

"They'd benefit from a military man right now... And you're"-

-"A man the military doesn't want."

"It's not much of a military, Nic..." said Darvin.

"No," Haryl conceded.

"So we're agreed then?"

"Rendezvous...?"

"To be confirmed."

Haryl saluted, with more than a trace of irony. "Sir!"

"At ease..." Darvin spoke more quietly. "Basically, _we've_ all got a reason to go in there, and you don't... Add to that, UniS would kill you just for being an embarrassment to them, and with these people I really think you could be useful..."

"I know," Haryl acknowledged. "I know."

As Kever and his people stood back and Haryl joined them, Darvin led Rissa, Caul, Juni and Faal - and the reluctant Brintun, unsure of his status in this group - into the dome, weapons at the ready.

* * *

"Here you are at last..." said _Travis_ , walking slowly around Servalan like an animal stalking its prey, heavy military boots squeaking on the floor, the durable black uniform creaking as he moved. His slicked back hair was grey, but he remained muscular and only a little heavier than when she had seen him last on the planet Goth. "Do you know how long I've been waiting for this meeting, _Supreme Commander_...?" - Once again, his tone lent her former title a mocking quality - "But all the time I knew, it was inevitable... The universe that wouldn't let me die, why would it deny me my revenge...?" He pointed the gun at her and smiled, his remaining eye cold. "You always had a way with words, Servalan... Any _final_ ones...?"

"What kind of gun is that?"

Her question was far from expected, and _Travis_ frowned. "I'm sorry...?"

"What kind of gun...? Where did it come from? How did you get here? Precisely how many years have you been waiting? What is the ambient temperature? Just how gullible would I have to be to believe that the creature standing before me is _really_ Travis?"

"All right..." His lip curled slightly. "Perhaps I did underestimate you..."

"That you do at your peril, fool! Do you think I have survived all this time by accident? Or worse, by luck?! Think again!"

"Yes..." he said, amused. "I"-

-"Be _silent_!" she screamed. "I want to hear one thing from you, and one thing only... And that is the location of your master... Where is he? Where is Avon?!"

"He's not my master..." said _Travis_. "We are equal partners in a common enterprise."

"I'm sure that is exactly what he wants you to believe..." said Servalan, perfectly calm now. "Oh, and you really don't like it when someone else asks the questions, do you...? Inquisitor-general... Yes, I concede that you and Avon have proven adept at hiding yourself from me for all these years, but I'm afraid not everything has eluded me... I know just who and _what_ you are..."

"I doubt that."

"The last of the Andromedan invaders... But perhaps not for much longer..."

"And yet it is I who hold the gun..."

"Which you haven't used."

"Fair point..." said _Travis_ casually. "I have underestimated you, I see that now..." He stepped back a little away from her, and gave a faint, sad smile - "Goodbye... _Supreme Commander_..."

As she watched, his entire form shimmered and pulsated - and reformed itself - before taking on another human shape... A very familiar one, and somehow even though she understood as much as any human could what this creature was, Servalan's breath caught for a moment.

"Servalan..." said _Avon_. A simple greeting, and he waited for a response.

" _You_ are not who I've come to see..." she said finally.

"No..." he said ruefully. "No, I'm not... But I think, in some way, you are the one I was seeking... I didn't know till now..."

"What are you talking about?"

"Just that... I need to tell you that it's over... The war. No one won... We all lost."

She frowned, searching for some way to respond. "Is this a surrender?"

"An acknowledgment. Our two species are no longer at war. What's left of them... I think one of the few things we have in common is, ultimately, a need for some kind of closure..." He moved forward a little. "It's _over_ , Servalan. Now we can all find peace... For the time we have left."

Her expression hardened. "You find _peace_..." she breathed. "I came here to find _Avon_..." As she walked around him and stalked away, she called back, "The _real_ Avon!"

The Inquisitor-general, still wearing Avon's form, considered her words and finally said "If there is such a thing."

* * *

"The last time I met Avon..." Brintun mused, "He said he'd kill me if we met again..."

"Let's hurry up and find him, then..." said Rissa - "Now we know there's no down side."

"The last time _I_ met Avon..." said Darvin, "He said _Well done_... I was so happy." He shrugged, and looked briefly at his feet before adding, "Sorry... _Man crush_..."

"What had you done?" asked Caul.

"Shot someone who was about to kill him..." Darvin answered. "Yes, it's all my fault, basically, all this."

 _"Up ahead..."_ Orac interrupted, again speaking through Darvin's bracelet. _"I believe even you might be able to find your way from here..."_

"Thanks..." said Darvin. "How can we ever thank you?"

 _"By never requiring my services again..."_ Orac replied. _"Although I am sure that will transpire to be a forlorn hope..."_

* * *

"I still don't understand..." Mara was still trying to pin Avon down on his intentions. "What do you hope to gain...? You think you can just threaten them and they'll go away and leave you alone...? With this weapon hanging over them...?"

"Precisely..." he said, monitoring a few of the display monitors. "Come in...!" he said abruptly, just before the main doors opened and allowed Darvin and his party to enter. "Always room for more... Welcome to you all... Try not to _touch_ anything..."

"Avon..." Darvin greeted him with studied nonchalance. He approached Mara. "You all right?"

"Never better..." she replied, a little annoyed at being interrupted when she was close to getting answers from Avon, but still happy to see them. She greeted Caul with a brief hug, and after only a moment's hesitation accepted Rissa's enthusiastic hug as well - She gave Juni and Faal a wan smile of awkwardness.

Avon's cold gaze was fixed on Brintun. "Hello again."

"Avon"-

-"Why are you here...?"

"Why, to talk to you on behalf of Unified Systems... It's past time we"-

-"Where is she...?" Juni demanded. "Where is Servalan? What have you done with her?"

" _You've_ grown," said Avon with only a fleeting glance at her before fixing on Faal. " _So_ , not entirely extinct."

"Not entirely," said Faal.

"I'm afraid..." said Darvin - Avon looked down at the gun he was holding, and indeed _pointing_ at _him_ , "I'm going to have to insist you answer her question."

"Insist..."

" _Yeah_... Sorry."

Avon grinned. "Think nothing of it..." He turned to Juni, and said, "You're right... It's past time for the grownups to talk, but in the meantime I thought... Since the children are getting impatient - That's _you_ , in case you misinterpreted what I was saying..." - His gesture encompassed all of them - "It would be more efficient to deal with you first."

"Deal with us...?" queried Darvin. "What does that mean, exactly?"

"Oh, don't worry... If I had wanted to kill _you_ , I could easily have let the Andromedans do it on any one of a number of occasions... As for the rest of you... Why go to so much trouble to bring you here, if I had merely wanted to..." - He looked around them calculatingly - "I haven't seen a group like this in one place since..." He paused for so long they started to wonder if there was something wrong. _"Before..."_ he said at last.

Juni walked up and stood very close to him. "And just how do you plan to deal with Servalan...? She is your other grownup, I take it?"

"I don't know if you remember..." said Avon, "She brought you with her to my prison cell, a couple of times... I thought I had lost my capacity to be surprised..."

"I remember she told me not to trust you, and that's advice I've never forgotten."

He grinned again. "Probably wise."

"Avon..." cut in Brintun, visibly annoyed at having been sidelined. "This is all... quite unimportant. Your business is with Unified Systems, it cannot fail to be, and I am its representative..."

"Incorrect."

"What?"

"I sent a message to UniS... Direct to Scarn. A short time ago. Detailing my requirements. So far, the payment has not been made, so..."

"So...?" Brintun eyed the cobbled-together control room Avon had created out of the dome's auxiliary operations centre. "You'll destroy everything we've created... All the good we could do for the entire human race... what's left of it... For what? Because we wouldn't fund your retirement in luxury...?! I offered you everything! And you refused it!"

"You're assuming..." said Avon, "that I wanted the money."

Brintun began to understand, but it was Mara's reaction Avon was watching as she came forward to stand in front of him. "You... wanted them to ignore you..." she reasoned. "You want to fire the weapon."

He spoke low enough so only she could hear. "I want to make it up to _him_..." he said. "I owe him."

"If they think for a moment that you're actually going to do it... They'll attack this place. They'll kill us all."

"Not _you_..." he said a little louder. "The System ship is returning to close orbit... Very shortly, it will come back into teleport range and take you on board."

"You don't owe Blake your _life_..." said Mara. "Come with us."

"It needs to be _your_ ship..." he replied. "Never go _back_."

"You're not actually going to fire... Are you?"

"Excuse me..." said Darvin. "But did you say that ship is going to take Blake on board...? What do the rest of us do?"

"Have no fear... Just keep your bracelets from your old ship fastened... They _are_ compatible..."

"I'm not leaving without Servalan," said Juni, unfastening the bracelet from her wrist and throwing it on the floor.

"Why don't you go ahead and stamp on it?" Rissa mocked, rolling her eyes for Caul's benefit - He just looked like he would rather be absolutely anywhere else. Unnoticed, Brintun had backed over to one of the other exits and now, with one last look back, he ducked out and hurried away.

With his elegant economy of movement, Faal picked up the bracelet and moved over to Juni. "Don't try to..." She got angry as he attempted to put it back on her wrist, and snatched her arm away. He persisted and finally, reluctantly, she let him fasten it.

" _I_ am going," he said quietly. "I'll go alone if I must, but... Do not make me choose."

"I... wouldn't make you choose," she replied, staring up at him, her other hand wrapping around the bracelet - Oblivious, as was everyone else, to Rissa miming along with her on the other side of the room.

"Thank you..." said Faal. Seeing she was still uncertain, he added, "I think _this_ is where she wants to be. Where she has wanted to be all along."

Rissa was the first to notice that Brintun was gone, and she silently cursed her own carelessness. "He's gone! That shit!"

"Let him," said Avon casually.

Mara frowned. "All part of the plan?"

"He's not important."

"How long do we have before this ship comes for us...?" Darvin asked.

"Possibly too long," Avon replied. "UniS will be coming for us too, sooner rather than later."

"Well, then..." said Darvin, "What you need is, perhaps, a small guerilla unit, with a little bit of combat training between them, who could hold the advance force off for a while."

"I was hoping you could suggest someone...!" Avon replied, grinning.

* * *

"Open this door!" Servalan commanded, no longer caring that her emotions were getting the better of her. "Open it!" She looked around for another camera. "Avon?!" As the Inquisitor-general in Avon's form entered the junction behind her, she looked at it for a moment before she was satisfied that it wasn't actually _him_. "What do _you_ want?"

"Answers..." it shrugged. "I've always wanted answers, nothing more or less... I was engineered, _bred_ , to seek answers to every question in the universe, from the most fundamental aspects of existence to the smallest details... And nothing else has ever had the same effect on me as... human emotion."

She turned to face him - or rather _it_. "Why should that concern me?"

The transformation process began again, and the form of the Inquisitor-general became that of a slender-built young woman in a lilac dress of diaphanous cloth and leather, red-gold hair long and immaculately-dressed, smooth skin milky. For a few moments, Servalan did not respond.

"Do you mock me...?" she breathed. "First Travis, then Avon. Now..."

"Not at all..." said _Juni_. "I was just curious to see how you would respond, that's all."

Servalan's jaw tightened, and she turned back to the door. Taking a small device out of a concealed pocket, she pressed it against the cool metal surface near where she judged the locking mechanism to be, and it emanated a low hum. "Did you think a locked door would defeat me?" she said quietly. "I'll get through a dozen, a hundred... A thousand if that's what it takes to get to you."

"Why don't you want to talk to me...?" _Juni_ inquired.

"Because you're not _her_ ," Servalan replied.

"A curious reason..." it mused. "You are after all quite prepared to pretend the other Juni is real... Why not this one...?"

"Because you are nothing but my memories of who she was... Inside, you are empty... Nothing."

"I believe my point stands... _I mean_ , you're a survivor, you're surrounded by survivors... Juni, by definition, is not a survivor... She died in that shuttle crash. She is dead. Why keep her, when you can discard everyone else so easily...?"

Letting the device continue its work, Servalan turned to her. "The others, I could tolerate after a fashion. But this..."

"Got a little too close, did I...? Too close to the _real_ Servalan..."

"I made myself vulnerable to her... The closest thing I've ever had to... family."

"When I died..." Juni began.

"I never grieved..." said Servalan. "I didn't know how. I still don't. It was simply a problem to be solved, and a problem _always_ has a solution."

"I see that now..." said _Juni_. "Thank you." As Servalan watched, the Inquisitor-general metamorphosed again, gaining in height and bulk until a familiar form took shape. Juni's delicate features and silky skin became a harder, more rugged face disfigured by a scar.

"Blake..." Servalan breathed, a chill traveling up her spine.

"A long time..." The deep voice of the man who had been both the bane of her existence and the foundation of her once-valued career. When had been the last time she had heard that voice...? Close to thirty years ago...

"Yes."

"See you again perhaps, before the end."

"The end?"

"My questions..." he said. "They're all answered... I think I finally understand..." His face creased into a smile of satisfaction and he left, hefting the gun in his hand - A sense of purpose in his stride. Where to, she would not even attempt to guess. Servalan turned back to the door, waiting for the lock to be disengaged, ignoring the tears that had welled in her eyes.

* * *

Admiral Zanso, from the bridge of his new flagship - much smaller than Leviathan - watched on the multiple screens as the attack on the dome commenced. "All stations, report readiness...!" he commanded.

_"Sir... Ground attack in place... Breach gun being assembled..."_

"How long?"

_"Estimate a few minutes, sir."_

* * *

"They're coming..." said Avon, turning from the monitors. "Time is _not_ on our side..." He beckoned Mara over to him and placed a small device in her hand. "Take this."

"What is it?"

"Orac..." he replied. "When he's finished here, we'll be parting ways... He won't be able to refuse your summons if you plug that into any compatible device... And it can be made compatible with practically any computer."

"You're giving us Orac?"

"I just said so."

"Wait a minute here..." Darvin protested. "Sorry if I'm jumping on some kind of wagon here, but _I'm_ not going anywhere without Or-" He corrected himself. "Without Servalan." He looked over at Juni, looking slightly askance at their rare moment of solidarity.

"The ship won't take her." said Avon. When Darvin stared at him questioningly, he added, "Hard wired. That goes for Brintun too."

"Its choice...? Or yours?"

"I'll look after her..." said Avon. That got him another questioning look from Darvin, but Avon ignored that and turned to Mara. "Learn from _his_ mistakes..." he said, and paused. "Learn from mine."

"You're really not coming with us...?"

"I'm needed here. Besides, seven of you are all that's required."

She smiled faintly. "If you count both the computers, it's eight."

"Then only count one of them."

Her faint smile became a broad one for a moment, before vanishing. "I don't know what to say..."

"Then say nothing. Just go." Avon turned away and got back to final calibration of his makeshift weapon. With a glance at the others, Mara led the way up the stairs and out of the operations room - Darvin climbed quickly after her, and blocked the exit.

"You're assuming my cooperation, then?"

Mara spoke quietly. "I... hoped." Glancing again at the others, she added, "I don't think this will be possible without you." When he just stared at her, she added, "Back there... I don't know if you even noticed, but... You called me _Blake_."

Darvin looked at her for a long moment and finally shook his head slowly. She continued to lead the way, her back to him - Leaving it up to him whether to follow her or not.

When it came to it, the moment of perhaps the most important decision of his entire life, he followed.

* * *

The explosive impact of the breaching gun boomed across the bleak landscape, loud even through the ear protectors of the UniS artillery unit - Inside the dome, even at the far side of the massive complex it created a noticeable tremor.

The first UniS troops advanced through the smoke, masks set to filter the noxious air - It was mere minutes till they encountered their first potential hostile, and they very nearly shot him till it became apparent he was who he claimed to be.

"Right...!" Brintun asserted, trying to calm himself after so nearly being killed by his own side - "This operation is now under my command...! Take me to the officer in charge!"

* * *

As the sound of the massive explosion and breach of the dome's exterior reached them, Mara and Darvin glanced at each other, and then at their makeshift defensive position near the operations room. _It'll hold_ , they both lied with their eyes.

* * *

Avon looked up from his work as an alert sounded - He had an incoming comms call. Frowning, he leaned over and accepted it, mildly surprised by the face that appeared on the screen.

 _"Tarrant..."_ he acknowledged. "Why this face?"

The Inquisitor-general used the appropriated face of Del Tarrant to smile ruefully. _"I think... Basically, I think so that you won't miss me too much... This is it, Avon."_

"Here we are. Finally."

_"Good luck."_

"And to you..." Avon leaned in to terminate the call. "Goodbye, _Tarrant_."

* * *

DSV-A1 descended into low orbit, and as it did so it became visible to the UniS flagship's scanners. Once that was reported to him, Admiral Zanso became incensed, a fanatical gleam taking hold of his eyes, and he leaned over the scanner table, pounding his fist onto its scratched surface.

"Destroy that ship!" he cried. Before anything could be done, the ship shook violently and the artificial gravity fluctuated alarmingly - The bridge crew were too busy finding their feet to report to their Admiral immediately.

"What happened?!" he screamed.

_"Sir... Some kind of suppressing fire... Low impact but wide spread... Scanners offline... We'll have them up momentarily..."_

"Not good enough!"

DSV-A1 continued on its descent, unconcerned by the chaos left in its wake. Closing in on its rendezvous point.

* * *

"Now..." Mara said to Caul, gripping his shoulders. "At the first sign of UniS troops, you get behind the rest of us and stay under cover... All right?"

Caul's glance flicked over to Darvin and Rissa for the briefest moment. "I'll fight. If the rest of you are fighting, so am I."

"Fighting, that's right. Maybe dying too!"

"Then I'll die as well. The last thing I want is to be the only survivor."

"Makes sense..." said Rissa, busy looking over her own weapon and those of the others, checking for faults. _You stay out of this_ , said Mara's expression, but she didn't say it aloud - Seeing Caul's determined look, she left it at that.

Darvin took her aside. "Very wise..." he said.

"I have leadership potential, do I? Fortunate, since that seems to be my preordained role - Whether I like it or not."

"That's exactly the sort of thing no one needs to hear their leader say..." Darvin clasped her shoulder and smiled. "That lesson was for free."

They barely got into position behind their makeshift barricade before the first UniS assault troops arrived, and very quickly the corridor junction was filled with deadly munitions being fired back and forth, the air alive and buzzing with the lethal projectiles. Caul noted that Rissa rarely fired, choosing her targets very carefully, and he followed that pattern. When he killed one of the attackers, he was filled with elation, and in his heightened state he managed to forget that he had just snuffed out a human life.

"How long can we keep this up?" Mara managed to gasp vaguely in Darvin's direction.

"Not long enough, probably. But"-

-Whatever he had been about to say was lost in the sudden noise as a hole was blown through the wall to the side of them, and another detachment of UniS soldiers poured through it - Scattered and disoriented, and without cover against this flanking attack, they were all suddenly very vulnerable... The fight was over almost before it had begun.

Caul shot with precision into the smoky gap in the wall, and managed to down one of the attackers and temporarily block the others behind him - He had gained them a little time, but it was unlikely to be enough...

 _"It was good while it lasted...!"_ Mara thought she heard someone say - With her ears ringing, it could have been any of them. She was intensely aware of one particular gun barrel pointed directly at her, and could do nothing but wait for the flash...

Then it was different - Changed, somehow... The UniS troops were scattering, retreating, shot down one by one... Rolling clear, she looked up the other corridor... and saw why...

Roj Blake - or at least the Inquisitor-general wearing his shape - strode confidently toward them, unconcerned by the fire directed at him and shooting down one UniS trooper after another. Smiling gleefully, laughing even... The UniS troops, whether or not they knew who this man was, what he had _been_ , what he represented, fell back with something approaching superstitious terror.

Mara and Darvin looked at each other, awestruck, questioning - Before either of them could speak, they and the others were encased in a bright white outline and vanished with a crackle of energy. Baffled, the attackers milled around in disarray, and yet more of them were picked off by _Blake_ 's devastating intervention.

Finally, several UniS-issue weapons found their mark and _Blake_ was hit - He continued firing even then, but eventually the combined damage from the impacts was too much and he sank down. A few more shots, all of them missed, and the gun fell from his suddenly limp hand. He was kicked to the ground and lay immobile, still smiling.

As the emboldened UniS troopers surrounded him and fired more projectiles into his motionless form, his face continued to wear the beatific smile - Only when his shape reverted, to their astonishment, to its grotesque Andromedan form did the smile vanish with the rest of his human identity.

In time, those details would be rendered unimportant. All that would be remembered was that on this day, in this fight, Roj Blake had died for his cause. A hero for all time.

* * *

 _"Attention!"_ interrupted Orac. _"Unified Systems personnel now cutting through secured access points and about to interrupt flow of power to the weapon..."_

"How long?" Avon asked calmly.

_"Estimate four minutes to access, indeterminate time to interruption of power, dependent on level of competence of said personnel..."_

"Thank you, Orac..." Avon moved to another console. "If main power was interrupted, how long would the batteries hold?"

_"I cannot guarantee that they would hold at all."_

"All right..." Avon moved a hand over his face, resting his tired eyes for a moment. "You've done enough, Orac. Time for you to transfer away from here. Delete all signets as you go. Leave _no_ trace behind."

_"Acknowledged..."_

There was quite a long pause before the operation began, and Avon frowned. "Why the delay, Orac?"

_"Goodbye, Avon."_

The computer's voice entirely maintained its haughty air, but the words and the sentiment expressed were still, frankly, astonishing and Avon could not possibly keep the surprise from showing itself. "Really?"

 _"You are unquestionably the least tiresome of humans... Comparatively speaking, of course."_ With that, Orac's core software departed from the dome's servers, and on one of the monitors Avon watched as all traces of his presence were deleted.

"Of course..." he murmured, amused - Alone now, he added quietly to himself, "Goodbye, Orac."

 _"Avon..."_ a voice crackled from the same speakers - not that of Orac, but that of Sol Brintun. _"Avon, can you hear me...?"_

"I hear you."

_"Listen very carefully, Avon, because we don't have much time. I have just received orders to evacuate this place... An enormous strike is about to be launched against you... Now, you know the weapons this place was designed to withstand have long been superseded... We can crack this dome like an egg shell, you know that's true..."_

"Not arguing with you, Brintun..."

_"We both know you're not actually going to fire, so... Why die for nothing...? Come with me, and we can talk rationally... You have so much left to give... And there are such rewards we can grant you... You can live the rest of your life in luxury, in exchange for simply making your knowledge and experience available... In time, who knows...? You could rise high in our administration, once you have shown President Scarn that he can trust you... Avon, what do you say?"_

"To Scarn? Much the same thing I said last time we met."

_"Well, I don't know what that was..."_

"I know..." Smiling, Avon leaned close to the most convenient microphone on one of the consoles. "It's for A-grades only... _Lieutenant_. Goodbye."

_"Avon...! You're not going to fire...! We both know that...! Av"-_

Slamming his hand down, Avon cut off the communication, and his hand moved to another control... Hovered over it for a few seconds, waiting... Could he not bring himself to do this after all? Such was his focus, he did not see the door to his left open and close silently, or the dark-red clad figure who entered and stood taking in the situation...

His hand slammed down again.

* * *

Giving up trying to restore his comm-link with the operations room, Brintun turned as several UniS soldiers and technicians approached down the corridor at a run. "Well...?" he demanded. "Did you get through?"

"Partially..." one man gasped. "But we ran out of time... The alert came through... We have to evacuate at once!"

"What does _partially_ mean?!"

"We cut through some of the cables... There was no time to consult the charts... It could have been anything..."

"All right..." Brintun said, exasperated and suddenly very weary. "Let's just get out of here..."

* * *

"AVON!" Servalan screamed.

He looked up slowly, not allowing any emotion, be it surprise or whatever else, to register on his face. His gaze locked with hers for several seconds, then he looked down at the panel. ACTIVATED. BEAM ENGAGED.

He frowned at the new message that appeared. POWER SYSTEMS FAILURE - SUBSPATIAL CARRIER NOT INITIATED - BEAM PROCEEDING AT 300,000 KILOMETRES PER SECOND APPROX.

He looked up at her again, and she stared back with barely contained fury. As he watched, and as she took in exactly what was happening, her expression changed to something else. A melding of lots of conflicting emotions, with her rage of a moment ago contained beneath.

She moved closer, as he moved away from the console and maintained his distance. Servalan took a look at the readouts, and watched as the information was updated... ENEMY SHIPS CONVERGING - INTERSECTION WITH BEAM IN 1.5 MINUTES.

Her look said _What have you done?_

He smiled, just as he had on Gauda Prime... As UniS missiles locked on target and launched toward the surface.

* * *

 _"Sir..."_ said the captain of Zanso's new flagship - The Admiral's head snapped round to look at him, his jaw clenched. Heart hammering against his ribs, blood pulsing in his ears. "The weapon has been activated..."

Ready for this eventuality, and prepared, Zanso did not even hesitate. "Put us in its path...!" he commanded. "Now!"

The flagship, till its recent temporary adoption by the Admiral just one of UniS's many heavy cruisers, was placed in the path of the beam launched by the dome's main transmitter - A beam carrying an amplified electromagnetic pulse designed to shut down and destroy the electrical systems of an entire solar system. Thus, every system on board immediately failed and lost power, the electronics permanently destroyed, and the ship was left drifting helplessly in space.

Fortunately for those on board, the captain had transmitted a general distress call in the seconds before intersection with Avon's beam, so the chances of survival for its stranded crew were reasonable, even promising - The beam, meanwhile, invisible to the naked eye, continued on its path, its signal strength weakened so infinitesimally that it would barely register as an effect at all.

In just over 4 years, the beam would arrive at the Proxima system, with devastating results. Zanso had failed.

* * *

Servalan and Avon stood facing each other in silence. _Why?_ said her expression.

 _Why not?_ said his.

The missiles struck the dome in several places, and apart from the impact damage itself, for a couple of seconds nothing happened. Then an incandescent white light engulfed the entire structure and the landscape for miles around, vaporising and sterilising the area and leaving no life, and no possibility of life, for centuries to come.

This time, there were no survivors.

* * *

Haryl was on the last ship to leave, and thus saw the bright flash and heard the explosions sound across the landscape as UniS destroyed the dome. He and Kever looked at each other warily, and up at the other transports ascending to space - They all looked worryingly fragile. Hopefully, UniS would be too busy elsewhere to take any notice of them.

"I never said thanks..." said Kever awkwardly. "Without you, I think"-

-"No..." Haryl interrupted. "He was right... He was right all the time, damn him." He smiled faintly. " _This_ was the place to be."

* * *

DSV-A1 passed out of the Solar System and into interstellar space and soon left the few remaining pursuers far behind, unmarked, showing no signs of having been damaged by its brief conflict with the UniS ships.

The hexagonal corridors of the ship were deserted. That was unsurprising, but as they passed from aft to bow of the alien vessel - at least, they assumed that was the direction they were going in - Mara, Darvin, Caul, Rissa, Juni and Faal remained jumpy. A bad idea in the extreme to assume they were home and dry - A bad idea, whatever Avon had said, to assume they were _home_ in any sense of the word.

 _"INFORMATION...!"_ came the disembodied voice. Not a voice like the assessment machines on Pelios, detached and mechanical, but a voice with almost human-sounding inflections, resonant and clear. _"DEEP SPACE VEHICLE NEARING COMPLETION OF INTERNAL CONFIGURATION PROCEDURE... CAUTION SHOULD BE OBSERVED UNTIL PROCESS IS FULLY COMPLETE..."_

"What _is_ that...?" Darvin demanded.

"Computer..." Mara called, stepping forward and looking up. Then her expression changed, as though she had come to a decision. " _Zen_... Who am I...?"

 _"BLAKE IS RECOGNISED,"_ replied Zen. The others looked at her askance.

"And these others...?"

 _"PROCESSING CREW INVENTORY..."_ How did it manage to make that simple statement sound ominous...? _  
_

Rissa turned to Caul. "Looks like we're nobody." - "Don't worry..." he replied. "You'll get used to it." The two others remained silent - Faal withdrawn and aloof, apparently taking each new development in his stride, Juni hollow-eyed, watchful, all too aware her world had come crashing down around her and not yet ready to start picking up the pieces.

"Computer..." said Darvin, moving over to join Mara. "I am Stev Darvin... _Um_... My voice pattern is to be stored and recognised."

"Sorry..." said Mara. "But I really don't think it's as simple as that." She thought of her strange experience on this ship back at Galaxy City - A test, as she thought at the time...? Some kind of initiation...? A security measure...?

"More hoops to jump through...?" he asked nervously, and looked down at his artificial leg. "Could be tricky." She considered him for a moment - Soon, she knew, the loss of _Revenant_ , of Galaxy City, of _Servalan_ , would hit him. She reached out and touched his sleeve. A moment of assurance for both of them - Neither was totally alone.

* * *

_4.25 solar years._

As Brintun sat down in his private chamber on the UniS warship to begin his scheduled communication with President Scarn, the figure ran dully through his head, again and again. __4.25_ solar years._

The countdown to the end had begun. The end of everything.

It was his fault. He would argue against that conclusion most strenuously, of course he would - He had to, his life depended on it - but he knew the truth. It was his fault.

 _ _4.25_ solar years. _ One small mercy. Since the subspatial carrier wave that would have carried the beam instantly to its target failed to engage, that was the time it would take the pulse to reach Proxima Centauri and the ten inhabited planets around it. Some of them more than merely inhabited - heavily populated in fact. The centre of Proximan civilisation - through both luck and judgment left mostly unscathed by the Intergalactic wars, and now the nucleus of the expanding Unified Systems empire - Now doomed. In __4.25_ solar years._

Evacuation would take place, of course. The government and the wealthiest citizens, and as many _useful_ others as could be managed - but billions of people and the massive infrastructure that supported them could not be transplanted, even temporarily. It would be a disaster on a massive scale, devastation undreamt of even in the depths of the last war - Every powered device in the path of the pulse would be rendered permanently inoperable, and the cost in resources of the evacuation would be incalculable, let alone the prospect of somehow restoring their infrastructure from nothing. The setback to UniS and its military ambitions would be ruinous, the course of history changed.

His fault.

 _"I have received Doctor Guld's report..."_ the President began, and Brintun felt hollow inside, but strangely calm as though nothing really mattered any more. "So, we needn't start from the beginning, Sol. We can just proceed to your role in events."

"Yes, of course..." Brintun replied. "I'm sure Doctor Guld's account is sufficient to establish the most basic facts"-

-"I'm glad that's out of the way, then," said Scarn. "One thing she didn't clarify - Zanso?"

Brintun took a breath, and sweat gushed down his face. "Admiral Zanso... oversaw the successful evacuation of the flagship, then he... He retired to his quarters and... He shot himself... I have to report that the Admiral is dead."

"I'm so glad, Sol, that you had the courage not to take that way out..." Scarn commented, and Brintun found himself unsure if he was being mocked or not. "It would have been quick and easy, no doubt. Not your style, not at all."

"No." Brintun felt wretched, and numb, experiencing a strange sensation like he had climbed outside his own body and was perched precariously on the edge of the chair next to himself, clinging on with his fingernails to avoid falling off. He experienced a heart palpitation, prompting a new surge of sweat to be released through his pores. No longer caring if the President saw it or not, he wiped his sodden scalp and face with a cloth. "I will... begin coordinating efforts to find a way of blocking or neutralising this beam at once... After all, we have over four years"-

-"Already being done, Sol. All in hand. Some very interesting ideas have been put forward already, and I'm sure we'll try them all if necessary."

Brintun felt his last hope slipping away, and his face twitched as sharp pain shot through his chest and down his arms, leaving behind a dull ache. "And... my role...?"

President Scarn considered his former Chief Advisor for a moment. "Come home, Sol. By the time you arrive, I'm sure a few things will have been decided. Just come home." The screen went dark.

"Yes..." Brintun gasped. "I..." He felt consciousness slipping away, and as his sweat-soaked body slid from the chair, leaving it damp, he scrabbled frantically for the comms switch... "I... Emergency...!" he gasped. "Medical assistance... Come... quickly...!" He slumped to the floor and blacked out.

* * *

Finally, guided by some innate, inexplicable sense of the ship's geography, they came to a short corridor leading into a large open area. Peering cautiously into the dimly-lit chamber ahead, Mara and Darvin were the first to see it opening out before them as the illumination was brought up to their comfort level... Their attention was drawn immediately to the huge bank of control panels arranged on three levels, with five separate seated stations. Everything was gleaming black and chrome, the floor shiny and unmarked by the touch of any foot.

Theirs would be the first.

Mara and Darvin looked at each other, the others holding back. Each had a questioning look - Finally, Darvin shrugged and made the smallest gesture with his artificial arm. _You first..._

Cautiously, Mara moved forward and advanced to the end of the corridor... and Blake stepped onto the flight-deck of the Liberator.


	19. Chapter 19

**Galaxy City**

It was difficult to hear anything over the noise of the landing craft, as the Children of Light busied themselves making Galaxy City their new base. Even so, Miko did his best to greet Tylner as he strode down the embarkation ramp and walked with a briskness that belied his apparent frailty toward the main concourse.

"You will find everything ready, I trust... I hope..." Miko's confidence in handling the assault evaporated when faced with the forbidding countenance of his superior, and he found himself stammering.

"I trust and hope, yes..." said Tylner. "As should we all..." His one eye gleamed with an inner light - "In this place we will consolidate our forces... Then... The final phase... When we face the light, it will not be alone... But in the company of the entire human race."

Miko felt a radiant sense of well-being wash over him, and he intoned delightedly, "Only from his hand... comes _death_..."

* * *

**Somewhere else...**

When Servalan came to, it was dark. Without considering whether or not it was wise to, she spoke the first word that came to mind.

_"Avon..."_

_"Servalan."_

He was there, close by, though even now her vision was not clearing - Wherever this was, light was not merely dim but entirely absent. "I can't see."

"That's because the lights are out."

"Also, I can't move."

"You will." His voice sounded almost rueful, certainly conflicted.

"I thought we were both dead." There was a pause, and Servalan was practically deafened by the utter absence of sound in the mini-eternity before Avon's answer finally came.

"Unthinkable." Just as he said that, she experienced a flash of memory, and recent events started to come back into focus...

* * *

"Here..." said Avon earnestly. "Take this... We have seconds!" Servalan looked at the bracelet thrust into her hand, like that from the Liberator, Scorpio or even Revenant but of a somewhat unfamiliar design - but only for a moment. Her survival instinct was strong, even now, and she obeyed his urgent request...

* * *

"Where are we?"

"Not as simple a question as you might believe..."

"Well... I might have known you would have a means of escape."

"That's possible." This time he sounded like she had just made an interesting point he hadn't considered before.

"Well...?"

"Well, what?"

"What now...?"

" _First_ , define what you mean by _now_..." he pondered.

"I knew I should have killed you when I had the chance..."

"Think positively, Servalan... I'm sure there will be many more chances..."

"Do you really...?"

"Of course..." Servalan couldn't see Avon at all, but knew nonetheless he was looking directly at her - She pictured _that_ smile. " _Some_ of us are clearly meant to live _forever_."

* * *

**Next time...**

* * *

_**"I was expecting Avalon..."** _

**_"And I was expecting an old man with a scarred face."_ **

**Neither the young woman's attention nor her gun-arm wavered for so much as a moment, and Blake moved forward slowly, hesitantly. _"Well, I'm doing my best..."_ she said, trying to disarm the situation - _"Give me time..."_**

**The Liberator is back. Blake is back - sort of - and battle is joined against the forces of President Scarn. All too soon, however, the new team is scattered and tested to the limit - Only with the help of veteran fighter Del Grant and legendary resistance leader Avalon, Scarn's most implacable opponent, can they possibly hope to survive. As events lead toward a deadly confrontation, Blake must face the hardest lesson of all - A leader is always alone.**

**Storm Mountain awaits...**

* * *

**Blake's 7: Liberators**

**2019**


	20. Chapter 20

_"You really think he's gone this time...?"_

_"Gone, or just hiding again..." Blake turned to face Darvin, and kept her voice as low as his. "What does it matter...? Avon has left us quite a mess to clean up." Starting to turn away, she stopped as it became clear he wasn't finished._

_"Or... We could just turn this ship, the most powerful ship in existence right now, turn it around and head out there, and find something better for ourselves..."_

_"Leave...? Leave them all?"_

_"Leave."_

The crew of the new Liberator stand at a crossroads. Initial victories against UniS's military forces are encouraging, and Blake is not the only one among them who has reasons to stay and fight President Scarn's corrupt tyranny. Internal divisions are soon the least of their problems, however, as Scarn unleashes the most formidable weapons in his arsenal and they find themselves stranded in the midst of their enemies - to add to their problems, even apparent friends may not be as reliable as was promised.

Storm Mountain awaits.

_"You are Blake...?" As Blake moved forward, she sensed that the older woman's question was more for the benefit of the others. Turning, she found that Del Grant, his face grim, would be no help in this particular situation._

_"You must be Avalon."_

_The woman smiled faintly. "I suppose I must be."_

 

* * *

**Blake's 7: Liberators**

 

**The sequel to Blake's 7: Survivors**

 

**Coming soon**

* * *


End file.
